


Adore Me

by Lorem_Yipsum



Series: Adore Me [1]
Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - High School, Crack, Fluff, JiHan, Jicheol, M/M, Magic, Shipping, Wizards, jeongcheol - Freeform, meanie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-21
Updated: 2016-01-09
Packaged: 2018-05-08 06:30:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 28,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5487098
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lorem_Yipsum/pseuds/Lorem_Yipsum
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The supernatural and the mundane intermingle at Pledis Magic School. The boys of seventeen are wizards. About half of them anyway. Jun is a vampire, Jeonghan an angel, Jihoon a potioneer, and Chan keeps summoning demons to his hyung's dismay. Mingyu is determined to make Wonwoo love him back.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Alchemy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> They are grouped into years by age. Those marked with a star are wizards.  
> Dorm Prefect: Seungcheol  
> Fourth Years: Jeonghan, Jisoo, Jun, Soonyoung*, Wonwoo  
> Third Years: Jihoon*, Seokmin, Mingyu*  
> Second years: Minghao*, Seungkwan, Hansol  
> First Year: Chan*

 

Mingyu walked in circles in the kitchen, munching on crab chips. For the five hundredth time he pondered if it wouldn’t be better to simply confess his feelings. Just get it over with, collect the obvious rejection and move on with his life – after crying for a month, probably.

But then again, ever since he had realized that his feelings for his best friend were of a different nature than simple camaraderie, he had gone through every possible way to confess and nothing seemed appropriate.

Wonwoo deserved something better than a meek “Hey I think I’m kind of in love with you, please don’t hate me.”

There was one more option of course. Mingyu wasn’t a third year wizard for nothing.

For weeks he had entertained the idea. A love potion – there had to be such a thing, right?

He put his snack back in its shelf, resolute to see if there was a magical solution to his problem after all. Seungcheol would not approve, but he didn’t have to know.

The boy in a sand colored uniform stopped as he reached the door frame, turning around with a look of careful consideration on his masculine face. After a moment’s hesitation Mingyu retraced his steps, took the snack into his hand again and continued to eat on the way.

 

***********************************

 

Chan was parked on the sofa, shoulders hanging low. Seungcheol loomed over him like a hyena ready to pounce. The sitting boy stared at his shoes. With a weak voice he mumbled “You don’t know what it’s like to be the only first year in the whole dorm.”

“Well, I’m sorry the school’s rooming arrangements are not to your liking, but that does not excuse summoning a demon, Chan. A ****ing demon.”

“Hey!” Jisoo’s voice came from behind. “That’s a thousand Won for the swear jar, Cheollie!”

Seungcheol pointed behind him, his eyes not moving from Chan. The oldest student and dorm prefect looked positively threatening in his unique, all-black uniform.

“If Jisoo hadn’t been here with his goddamn rosaries, [That’s another thousand Won, yelled Jisoo] you could have been killed or… well, I guess that’s the worst option. Should not have been leading with that.”

After a deep sigh, the prefect’s voice grew softer. “Anyway, don’t meddle with powers beyond your level of control. And learn to draw a proper pentagram.”

The youngest student was visibly distraught at the scolding, trying to vanish into his baby blue sweater, still avoiding eye contact.

“And another thing-” Seungcheol continued.

Jisoo began to play his guitar in the background. It took about ten seconds for the dorm leader’s heartbeat to slow down. Ten more and his muscles relaxed as if he had entered a hot tub. Finally his anger was dissipated, replaced by serenity - and vague desire for chocolate.

“Jisoo, I’d appreciate if you wouldn’t interrupt my justified reproaches with your magic.”

“Sorry,” said the musical boy in a pastel pink uniform, but didn’t stop playing.

Seungcheol shook his head. The dorm’s very own musician seemed to sprout new rosaries every few days. Currently he was wearing five around the neck and three more on his arm.

All mundane humans had collected some odd behaviors, the leader realized long ago. Being around wizards made life’s strangeness seem a lot less weird. He wondered what his own quirks were. But more than that he asked himself why headmaster-nim thought he – a regular human guy – could keep a bunch of wizard boys in check.

The leader was ready to leave the two boys alone when the cleaning brigade returned from the ritual chamber.

Jun almost exploded into the room, moving with a speed just barely below superhuman. He came to stand beside Seungcheol with fewer steps than any normal person would have required to cross the distance.

The Chinese boy was neither mundane nor wizard. When the headmaster said “mundane and supernatural intermingle at this school” he really meant it. Jun was a vampire – a creature of pure darkness. Not that you would see it on his handsome, dorky exterior.

“All cleaned up, leader hyung. No more demon gore left.”

With amazing speed, the boy sat down on the sofa and grabbed a controller, handing the other to Chan.

Seungcheol was about to remind the maknae that he had no privileges until he swore to stop demon summoning, but was struck by lightheadedness as the school’s other supernatural creature entered, half walking, half hovering.

Jeonghan’s blonde hair flowed gracefully in a none-existent breeze as he perched himself on the sofa’s armrest with the poise of a monarch, a playful smile on his lips. With Jisoo’s background music adding to the atmosphere, the leader was once again awe-struck by the angel’s radiant aura.

“Hm, you know,” angel Jeonghan said to Jun, “it’s not fair to use your vampire reflexes against a human.”

Jun pulled on the angel’s fluffy pink sweater to get him down onto the sofa. “Fine, take a controller, team up with Chan. I can beat the two of you any day.”

Seungcheol had to leave the room. The angel’s presence was just too overwhelming. How the creature of light and the one of darkness could be friends was a top item on his long, long list of things he didn’t understand.

 

*******************************

 

Libraries in magic schools are supposed to be magnificent testaments to the capabilities of wizardkind. With endless corridors stretching into infinity, a ceiling that shows the night’s sky on alien worlds and shelves full of book as old as time that whisper to any passer-by.

Pledis’ school library was an inconveniently u-shaped room with lights that were a bit too bright and an unreliable AC. The books were perfectly mundane. Vampire romances (read a hundred times by Jun), comic books (not present, as a permanent loan to a certain maknae), at least ten bibles (a generous gift from a rosary loving boy) and all manner of school books (mostly untouched).

The one truly unusual item was the book on the altar in the back: the grimoire.

Mingyu knew that the ancient tome looked completely different depending on its observer. Where most students saw a gold or wooden volume with delicate carvings and shimmering gems forming intricate patterns, Mingyu saw a very dusty book with glitter and sparkly stickers, like a kindergarten girl’s first diary.

He had never told anyone about it, but he figured he saw the book’s most embarrassing version because he felt so awkward being a wizard. Not enough that his height made him stand out - no, he had to be a magical special snowflake, too. For once it would be nice not to have all eyes on him.

Next to the volume was what was left of Seungcheol’s attempt to create a table of content. The constantly altering grimoire made a comprehensive list impossible, leaving the leader’s list with endless corrections, additions and strikethroughs.

Mingyu opened the book and began to turn page after page. The first ten sheets could not be skimmed and had to be turned individually – it was simply not possible to move past them. They all contained warnings in increasing urgency of content and franticness of handwriting.

Finally, the tall boy reached the book proper and began to skim. He wondered if the book was in English to the others as well. He didn’t dare to ask. If he was the only one, they would know how much being a wizard was burdening him. The grimoire was supposed to reflect the reader’s psyche after all, and everybody knew his English wasn’t brilliant.

In the back of his head he heard the leader’s warning. “Every wizard needs to read the small print. No casting if there’s anything on the page you haven’t read yet. It’s probably a warning.”

Once again Mingyu mused that the mundane dorm prefect would be a better wizard than most of the magically inclined students.

The problem was that everything in the book was small print. And even a random sigil in the margins could be highly important. Matters were aggravated by the fact that the occult symbols everybody insisted to see in the book looked like scrawly emoticon faces to him.

Half an hour later the boy had seen every potion recipe twice, forwards and backwards, Google translate helping him unreliably through the text. He had to look at each of them individually and spend an embarrassing amount of time typing words into his phone.

At least he had seen them all now. Thought that wasn’t entirely true. The book grew more pages the longer it was used, but it wasn’t presenting him with anything useful.

As much as he dreaded the idea, Mingyu wanted answers, even if it meant… going to the source of all potion knowledge: A tiny, angry boy with pixy-pink hair.

 

*********************************

 

There was a direct way to the potion’s lab but Mingyu needed to inquire something else first.

So he happened across the corridor were Jisoo was strumming along with Jeonghan leaning on his shoulder humming gently. Mingyu felt the gradually rising desire for a Twix even before the guitar string sounds reached his ears.

The angel had his eyes closed and didn’t look up as Mingyu approached but smiled nonetheless.

“Hey,” Jisoo said, “where are you going?”

The younger boy stopped for a moment. “That depends. Have you seen Jihoon?”

“Nope. Woozles is still holed up as always.”

Mingyu shrugged. “Then I need to find someone first, who can tell me if it’s save to enter.”

Jisoo grinned and gave a quick thumbs up without letting go of his instrument’s neck. “Good luck. You must be desperate to go to such measures.”

The tall boy sighed, considering if he should confess his plan to the hyungs. Jisoo wasn’t actually a wizard but a simple human who happened to possess a magic guitar. Maybe it was that instrument’s effect, but Mingyu felt comfortable opening up a little.

“There’s something I really could use a potion for. Not for me… well, yes for me, but not to use on me. There’s someone who I… um, let’s say I’ve considered the mundane approach for long enough to know it won’t work.”

Jisoo looked up at him with eyes twinkling. “Ah, you have a torn and shattered heart. I can sense it.”

“I… guess so?”

The metal string’s sounds echoed for a moment after the boy stopped playing. “I know how to mend a broken heart,” he whispered.

“R-really? How? Please help me, hyung.”

“Chicken!”

“Wha-“

“Chicken would heal your heart.”

Uncertainty about any possible response delayed Mingyu’s reaction until an awkward silence befell him and the musician, who looked up at him expectantly. Before the awkward silence turned into an even more uncomfortable staring contest, the younger boy turned around and left without a word, continuing his path toward his original objective.


	2. Divination

 

Wonwoo cuddled a mass of gold and black fluff, just as big as himself. Dogs scared Wonwoo, with the notable exception of this one. The boy and his canine companion laid on the game room floor, hand caressing fur, the ways he would never do with any other dog.

Huge, black eyes stared back at Wonwoo.

“You know, I really wish I could be a dog, too,” he said to the Labrador-Saint-Bernese-mix. “Even if I can’t get any other kind of magic, at least that would be nice.”

Always trying to wear as much black as his otherwise pink uniform allowed, the boy brushed a few stray animal hairs from his jacket where they were clumping up. The dog growled softly and put his head down into Wonwoo’s lap.

“I don’t know if I should tell you this,” whispered the boy, more to himself than his furry friend, “but I could really use some advice. You see, a little while ago I noticed that… well, I’ve always been friends with…- um, but now I’ve realized that my feelings go beyond that.”

Slowly stroking the long hairs of the animal’s coat, Wonwoo’s voice grew heavy. “It’s obvious he’s too good for me. I’m just a mundane and not a very interesting one at that. Half the time I feel like I don’t belong here. He’s never given me that feeling though. He was always so kind. That’s just how he is.”

Neither cuddle-buddy moved for a while. The comfortable silence making both sleepy. After a minute the boy could swallow the lump in his throat and continued. “There’s not much I can do. So I’ll just try to get over him. Anyway, I’m sure you have homework to do, and so do I, so I’ll leave you with that. Thanks for listening, Minghao. You’re a great friend.”

The heap of fur shifted back into human form as Wonwoo got up.

“Hey,” said the Chinese boy, “wanna play fetch?”

“Didn’t you- I just said I have homework.”

Minghao turned his head to the side in a decidedly canine fashion, tugging at his white sweater. “I can’t understand human speech when I’m shape shifted. Why, did you say anything important?”

“Um, no. Nothing. Thanks anyway. Let’s play fetch later. Bye.”

 

*********************

 

Mingyu’s head poked through the crack he had opened for himself, not daring to move the door farther into the room. The floor was littered with paper and he didn’t want to risk tearing or crumpling any of it.

In the center of the room, Hansol in his white second year uniform was sprawling on the bed scribbling yet another verse into one of the many notebooks he was surrounded by.

“Oh, Mingyu! Need anything?” The gold-chain-and-snap-back wearing boy gestured vaguely at the mess his poetic skills had turned the floor into.  “If it’s about something I borrowed, it may take a while to find it.”

“Nope, just here to ask if you’ve seen the Woozler. Is it save to enter his lair?”

Hansol chuckled. “I’ve brought him food. He got less sleep than usual but his mood was peachy.”

“Jihoon in good mood? That’s hard to believe.”

“Some rare herb has started blooming. He’s enlisted Seokmin to help harvest. Better ask the man what you need to know before he’s too busy brewing again.”

 

*********************

 

Timidly knocking at the potion’s lab, Mingyu waited for a response that never came. The room was pretty small. There was no way Jihoon hadn’t heard him.

With a deep breath he gripped the handle… and entered.

“Hello Woozles… no, I mean Jihoon. I’ll be gone in a second, I just nee-“

The pink haired boy in a jumpsuit was sitting at his desk amidst walls of overflowing shelves, harboring all manner of plant life, and bubbling cauldrons. The desk’s table cloth moved slightly were he sat.

Jihoon whipped his head around with a startled expression. “Oh, hey. What a surprise.”

Before the tall boy could advance, Seokmin climbed out from under the desk, just where Jihoon was sitting.

Now Mingyu was the startled one. What had he been doing under there? Had they…? Could it be that…? Jihoon and Seokmin? In here the whole time and no one suspected that they…?

“I-I’m so sorry,” stuttered the blushing Mingyu, “I should have knocked harder, I didn’t want to barge in you two two while… um, not that it’s any of my business and-“

Jihoon’s looked at the much taller boy as if he was looking at an idiot.

“Barge in on what?”

How could he be so nonchalant about this? Mingyu could barely force himself to make eye contact.

The pixie haired boy turned back to his table. “And close the door, the light levels and moisture in here require a careful balance. Also if you’re already here, you might as well join Seokmin.”

The broadly smiling boy from under the table gestured at the desk. “Come on, Mingyu. It’s fun, I’ll show you what to do.”

The school’s tallest wizard was flabbergasted. Not only were the boys unconcerned he had discovered their dirty secret, they wanted him to join.

“L-look, I never meant to-“

Jihoon groaned. “Will you stop sputtering nonsense? If you’re not here to help us harvest, you might as well state your business and leave.”

“Harvest?”

“Yes. This herb only grows in total darkness, that’s why I put it under the table. What did you think Seokmin was doing down there.”

Mingyu swallowed hard. “Nothing! Absolutely nothing! I didn’t think anything. Why would I think? You know me, I never think.”

“Too true,” Jihoon said with a chuckle.

“Aww,” cooed Seokmin, “don’t be so hard on yourself. Well then, see you.”

The always smiling boy vanished back under the table, to pluck more of whatever potion master Jihoon was growing there.

Mingyu shook his head to clear his mind of those terrible thoughts.

“Alright, I’ll make it quick. Please don’t ask any questions but I need to know if there’s such a thing as a love potion.”

Slowly spinning in his chair, Jihoon looked over the shelves of herbs and phials. “You need to know that for an assignment? I don’t remember getting one like that. Do you, Seokmin? No? Oh, right you’re not a wizard.”

With all of their dorm’s third years in one room, Mingyu couldn’t make them think his intent was purely educational. They knew the curriculum as well as he did.

“No,” said Mingyu, by now so embarrassed, he wished he was short enough to hide behind something. “I want to know for myself. Please don’t ask, just tell me.”

“Fine, I’m telling you there is no such thing. Not that I know.”

Jihoon spend all his time holed up in this very room. He was obsessed with creating magical concoctions and often didn’t see daylight for a week or two. Many mixtures required constant attention and care, but took over 24 hours to craft. Usually, multiple wizards were supposed to work on one potion alternatingly, but Jihoon insisted he could live without sleep.

Mingyu let his shoulders droop, about to slouch out of the room. If Jihoon didn’t know of a love potion, it certainly didn’t exist.

“…However,” the tiny herbalist said slowly, “now that I think about it. There is a potion that I might be able to alter for the desired effect. It won’t make that person love you - it just doesn’t work like that - but it will make them like you a lot more.”

“Please!” Mingyu yelled without thinking. Jihoon might make him beg for a while but just the thought of Wonwoo seeking his presence more often made any humiliation worth it.

To his surprise the potion brewer answered without hesitation or demanding compensation. His mood had to be exceptional.

“The formula you need is for the heart mending potion. Its main ingredient is chicken. The rest I forgot. Jisoo knows more about it then I do.”

 

**********************************

 

His legs crossed on the kitchen table, Jisoo removed a broken string from his guitar. Soonyoung and Seungkwan were attempting to make a pot of noodles big enough to feed the whole dorm.

“You’re not saying it right,” complained Seungkwan to the blonde boy, putting as much dramatic emphasis into his voice as possible to underscore his increasingly unquenched hunger.

“How would you know?” Soonyoung countered, “You’re not a wizard. It would work if you wouldn’t interrupt my incantations every five seconds.”

“I’m hungry. If we had turned on the oven, the water would be boiling by now.”

“No, this is faster, now let me cast.”

“No, just use the oven!”

“Casting!”

“Oven!”

The boys struggled loudly as Seungkwan tried to wrestle the silver wand out of his hyung’s hand, the boys a flurry of white and pink.

Jisoo strapped a new string into his instrument just as Mingyu entered.

The tall boy ignored the tussle at the stove and went straight to his last hope, with his head hanging.

“Hyung? I owe you an apology. I didn’t take you seriously and for that I’m very sorry. But I’ve you would still help me, I’d be grateful.”

Jisoo looked back and forth between his guitar and the remorseful wizard, calibrating the string. “You’ve made a wise decision, my friend. I can’t be mad at you. Now, still interested in my recipe?”

“Of course. That’s why I’m here.”

Sparks illuminated the room as Seungkwan hit the wand against the pot. “Make the water hot. Work already you piece of…” he side-eyed Jisoo, “wood.”

“Stop!” cried Soonyoung, “You’ll break it. Give it back, you can’t use it anyway.”

Two pairs of hands pulled on the wand which sent sparks like a roman candle all over the room. The fighting boys dropped the wizard tool and took cover behind a table, while Mingyu jumped into the alcove between two cupboards. Tiny fireballs swirled across the place.

Jisoo casually opened the window beside him, anticipating the stench of ozone that stray magic produced.

“See what you’ve done you silly boy,” yelled Soonyoung.

But Seungkwan only had eyes for the soon-to-be-pasta-vessel. “Look, it worked, it’s boiling.”

Their hunger far out-prioritizing their ephemeral animosity, both boys jumped up and grabbed a noodle package each. Dumping the content into the bubbling water, they silently forgave all that was said and done.

Mingyu waited until Soonyoung safely tucked away his wand before reentering Jisoo’s reach. “Do you think you can find the recipe again by evening? I’d like to start-“

Jisoo pulled a neatly folded piece of paper from his back pocket. “Knew you’d come back to hyung.”

Half expecting the formula for a hearty broth, Mingyu unfolded the paper and glanced over the ingredients. Those were not things Jihoon had in store. Those he’d have to get himself. But first he had to ask the grumpy pixie for the alterations.

“Thank you, Jisoo. You’ve helped me greatly. If anyone needs me, I’ll be at the supermarket, buying chicken.”

Newly tuned guitar sounds accompanied the boy as he left Jisoo and the cooks, who had found a new reason to argue.


	3. Abjuration

 

Too big to fit through the door all at once, the demon pried its way into the room, breaking pieces off the wall as if it was cardboard. It’s warty, purple tentacles blindly explored the space inside, inching in on the trapped students.

The first year wizard and his prefect had their back against the wall, their only exit on the other side of the room cut off by the moving mass of tentacles. Seungcheol considered if he could make the jump between the demon arms to reach the door, but it seemed impossible.

 “How could it escape the ritual chamber?” Seungcheol yelled, using a broken floor lamp as makeshift spear to keep the tentacles at bay.

“Must have forgotten a spike on the pentagram or something,” confessed Chan as he hurled a lightning bolt at the nearest demonic outgrowth, his wandholding hand shaking in fear. The scorch mark barely registered with the hell spawn.

“How? How can you possibly-“

The leader ducked below the huge, glibbery mass that tried to crush him. The demon’s disgusting head forced its way in between the arms, dozens of eyes locating the fighting boys.

Not a moment too soon, the door burst open and Jun rushed into the room, his ornate Dadao high above his head. The weapon dug into the hellish flesh, making it sizzle on contact. Hacking the rapidly re-growing tentacles, he created a path for Jeonghan to enter behind him.

“Where’s the church boy when you need him?” asked the leader in the angel’s direction.

“Just left for church.” Jeonghan smiled despite the situation at hand.

“Then send someone to his room.”

“Already did. Hansol should be here any second.”

Despite Jun’s best efforts the youngest and the oldest boy were still trapped and the disgusting creature was getting further and further into the room, the whole area filling with the stink of sulfur and molten flesh.

The angel found an opening and spread his arms in a dignified motion. Warm, gracious light radiated off the long haired boy, rays of solid sunbeams hitting the demon in his many grotesque eyes.

A deafening scream like a cross between a wounded hippo and an enraged lion made the walls tremble. The demon jolted back and gave the way free for the boys to escape.

Hansol arrived with his arms full of rosaries just as Seungcheol rushed the maknae past the tentacles that were winding in pain.

The young rapper dropped all religious items and held up the biggest he had found, intending to throw it towards the still hacking and slashing Jun.

In a surprise move, the hell spawn broke into the room, ignoring the suffering the angel inflicted upon it. Seungcheol threw Chan to the ground the stabbed his lamp at the multiple ton bulk of flesh descending upon him. He was brushed to the floor by a huffing Jun, who knocked the air out of his leader.

Seungcheol lost his weapon but saw the tentacle swing across empty space where his head had just been a second ago.

In one swift motion the arm changed direction and aimed for the unprotected Hansol. The rapper lifted the rosary in front of his face as a shield, not knowing if it would affect the demon at all.

As the warty arm passed the ring of wood beads it disintegrated immediately like passing through a wood chipper, a gory mess of black and green blood spraying Hansol, together with chunks of rapidly disintegrating flesh. The white outfit turned black and slimy.

The boy sputtered to keep the blood off his lips, his eyes shut tight.

Jun drove his katana into the stump and twisted his way to the main artery. Like a firefighter hose, the blood vessels sprayed the ceiling as they burst, raining green slime onto the group.

At last the demon cried out his final scream and slumped onto the floor, still blocking the entrance.

“Oops,” Chan whispered.

Hansol had wiped the worst off his face. “If anyone is looking for me, I’ll be in the shower for the next five weeks.”

The supernatural beings collected the rosaries while Seungcheol finally got off the ground, slowly coming to his senses again. Gore dripped from the ceiling into his already disheveled hair.

“Chan? We need to talk.”

As he approached his younger, the angel began to glow ominously, facing the demon cadaver. Seungcheol knew he had to leave if he wanted to keep his focus. The gorgeous offspring of heaven itself already floated above the ground in his still pristine clothes. He looked as enchanting as ever.

“Come on, Chan, we’re holding a meeting,” said the leader as he grabbed the unhappy boy by the collar, ignoring the slime stains on the blue fabric.

Once all others were gone, Jun and Jeonghan spoke a quiet incantation. The rotting corpse fragmented, leaving only blood splatters and slime behind as the purple flesh vanished piece by piece.

The angel laughed for a reason the other non-human instinctively understood. How inconvenient it had to be for these mortals, to do everything by hand.

 

************************

 

Wonwoo wasn’t trying to be pretentious. He just so happened to be staring out the window in a forlorn and melodramatic fashion when leader-hyung found him.

“Stop sulking and join our meeting. Conference room, now.”

“I wasn’t sulking.”

“Brooding then.”

“No, I- fine, I’m coming.”

But he had been sulking and he knew it. It was an unfortunate situation. Being away from Mingyu let him distract himself from his feelings which made him happy, but it also made him miss his friend’s presence, which made him miserable. Yet, being near Mingyu – while making him excessively blissful – increased his longing for more.

Wonwoo’s mind was a leaking ship amidst a tempest out on the open sea.

Maybe he should talk it over with Seungcheol. The prefect had honest concern for everybody’s well-being and seemed to know clever tricks of all kind to keep the dorm from falling to pieces.

The meeting was a very official seeming get-together in the conference room – usually reserved for when headmaster-nim had an announcement.

Chan sat at the head table, looking crestfallen. Behind the deflated boy was the oldest student, his hand firmly on the maknae.

“I have called an all-mundane meeting because the wizards tend to be way too lenient in dealing with magical misbehavior. We are here to hold assizes in regards to this individual’s misdeeds.”

Wonwoo looked around. Hansol wore a bathrobe and his hair was wet as if he had just showered. In the middle of the day? Weird. Seungkwan munched on a bowl of noodles, certainly not his first. Seokmin had dark stains of dirt on his sand colored uniform, probably from the potion’s lab. And Jisoo… was absent.

Wonwoo raised his hand, making the leader’s train of thought derail. “Hyung?”

“What is it, Wonwoo?”

“If it’s an all-mundane meeting, where’s Jisoo?”

“He hardly counts. He may not be a wizard but guitar-hyung has an artifact. I don’t want him fiddling with my emotions right now. Or ever.”

“Iiiik!” shrieked Hansol, as he pulled something slimy form his hair. “I have to shower again.”

Without another word the rapper jumped off his seat and ran off. The prefect yelled after him to no avail.

Wonwoo was dumbfounded. The solution to his problem had been right in front of him the whole time. An artifact that adjusted people’s emotions for the positive. As far as he knew, no one had ever fallen in love due to Jisoo’s music, but if he could get his hands on an artifact of his own…

He didn’t have to get over Mingyu, he could just make him fall in love back. For the first time in who knows how long, Wonwoo didn’t feel hopeless about his crush.

“Sorry, I just remembered something. I have to go.”

Seungcheol tried to stare him into submission but the boy was already up. The leader groaned.

“Stay here. Damnit. You can’t just all **** off when you like. This is a meeting.”

Chan perked up and looked behind him. “I’m telling Jisoo you said that.”

 

****************************

 

Twelve rosaries. That’s how many Wonwoo counted as he walked up to his schoolmate.

“Wonwoo, Helloooo! What can I doooo.  For yoooo.” Jisoo rhymed as he saw the boy of equal age approach. He was without guitar for once, sitting at a laptop, composing emails rather than songs.

“I was wondering if I could ask something. You might consider it a bit personal. I’m not sure.”

“Come through, Wonwoo. A conversation long overdue?”

“There’s a problem and I think I know a solution but I need more information that I think only you have.”

“Information tired and true. I shall supply to you. It’s good to know that you value. My angle of view. Wonwoo.

“It’s just… can you stop rhyming?”

“Um, sure. Wait, was that the personal question?

“No…”

The inquiring boy carefully turned the statement over in his head before speaking quickly. “How did you get your artifact and is there a way for me to get one, too?”

Jisoo looked off to the side, pondering something, his face showing great concentration. Was he trying to remember or just looking for a way to say it with a rhyme?

“Why would you need one?”

“It’s just that I see you put a smile on people’s lips all the time, so…” Wonwoo said, chastising himself for not having a better lie thought out in advance.

“No selfish motives then? You don’t intend to soil your flesh with carnality, do you?”

“Soil my…? No, no. What are you thinking? I’m Wonwoo the immaculate.”

“Let me tell you it was quite a journey. Everybody’s path is different. I don’t know if I can help with yours. Maybe start by casting a finding spell.”

Wonwoo pointed both thumbs at himself. “Not a wizard. Pure, boring mundanity.”

“You don’t need to be. Mundanes can support a wizard ritual. You need someone who loves to cast complicated charms.”

“…I know who you’re talking about. Thank you.”

“Always happy to give a clue. To you. Wonwoo.”

“O…kay. Bye.”

 

***************************

 

Minghao sprayed conjured dissolvent from his wand onto the ceiling, slowly removing the demon’s remains and returning the room’s roof to its former condition.

The slime dripped onto the wet floor where Seungkwan ran back and forth, shoving a mop in front of him. He had put on music and sang along as the room looked less and less like an otherworldly warzone.

Meanwhile the leader flipped through his personal notes, looking for the charms he needed Minghao to cast. The wall was still in pieces and the furniture was ruined. The Chinese boy knew all this expenditure would exhaust him, but he didn’t complain. For once everybody depended on him.

Headmaster-nim had been over to inspect the damage and offered to take care of it if the dorm’s inhabitants – represented by the prefect – didn’t feel up to the task.

Not that anyone would have expected differently, but Seungcheol wanted to appear in control even when the dorm was literally in shambles.

“So the wall repair will require three spells. One to gather the pieces, one to put them into place and one to mend the fractures. I guess we’ll have to paint it ourselves.”

Seungkwan interrupted his singing. “Not us specifically though, right? There are other boys in this building who are currently not helping.”

“Alright, I’ll build another team later. Minghao, you think you can shoulder all this casting? I’ll be scrubbing the chairs in the corner. Call me when you’re ready.”

A huge glob of goo dropped from above and splashed onto the sofa the leader had just cleaned. Minghao fought down a chuckle. Watching Seungcheol despair was way better than playing fetch.


	4. Attunement

 

With an exasperated huff, the tall wizard threw his groceries down on the kitchen table. In hindsight it had been a terrible mistake to offer doing everybody’s groceries, but he had needed to take the trip anyway. What a surprising amount of love potion ingredients one could purchase at the local supermarket!

As Mingyu plucked his belongings from the pile of food stuff the others had requested, Seokmin entered, in search of a snack.

“Ah, Seokmin, good to see you.”

The classmate smiled brightly back at him. “I know, I know. Whatever I decide on preparing for myself, I’ll be sure to make one for you too.”

“No, that’s not what… actually, thanks, that would be great. But the reason I wanted to talk to you is that I need your help with a potion.”

“Oh? I’m mundane, how could I help?” asked the puzzled boy as he eyed the contents of their dorm fridge.

“One thing I need is a bottled ray of sunshine. Thought I could put one of your smiles in a flacon. Should work, from what I can tell.”

“If you say so?”

Mingyu pulled out his phone and opened the camera. Seokmin shot him the brightest grin he could muster and *snap* the picture was taken.

After sending the photograph to the printer, Mingyu grabbed an empty bottle from under the sink and left with one less worry.

Two more things left to procure.

 

***************************

 

Seungkwan was easily located. The boy’s natural aura attracted unicorns reliably, in spite of his mundane nature.

Poised with princely grace, Seungkwan rode the horned, shining white stead along the street, returning from his regular stroll. Passerby’s view was magnetically transfixed on the glowing, most noble creature – and the unicorn.

“Boo!” called Mingyu as the rider came into earshot.

“Yes, what is it hyung?”

“Um, this is a little awkward but you’re the best guy to ask. I need unicorn tears. Could you… I dunno.”

“Tears you say?”

Seungkwan forcefully swung himself off the animal and Mingyu feared for a second the boy might kick his entrusted unicorn to get results.

Instead the boy took a deep breath and stuck on a ballad, rendered over what felt like twelve octaves with enough feeling to make Mingyu’s vision blur.

As the listening boy blinked away his tears, he saw the unicorn shed a never-ending stream from its deep, dark eyes.

What a voice.

 

***************************

 

The ritual room was very big and very empty.

Most rituals required to get physical and enough space was an absolute necessity. The master of ceremony himself was prancing from corner to corner, forcing Wonwoo to wait awkwardly leaning in the doorframe out of fear he could interrupt something important.

Eventually Soonyoung noticed him.

“Ah, have you been standing there for long?”

Forever, thought Wonwoo. “Not at all, “he said.

The dancing boy finished his last spin and came to a halt in the middle of the room. “Anything I can help you with?”

“I was just wandering, if I needed to find something – something only a ritual can find – could I do it?”

Soonyoung put his hands on his knees, catching his breath. “Not alone, I suppose, but with a wizard’s help I don’t see why a ritual couldn’t apply to you, too.”

“Great. Would you?”

“Sure. Come in. What do you need to find. Keys? A pen? Glasses? I think I’ve seen you wear glasses before.”

Wonwoo cleared his throat and quickly mumbled “An artefact that’s not attuned to anyone so I can use it.”

Soonyoung’s eyes widened as his jaw dropped. “That’s…”

“Oh, alright,” Wonwoo turned around, “forget it. It was a dumb idea.”

“Wait! We can do it. Let me just…”

The ritual specialist picked a tattered notebook from a chair at the wall and flicked through the pages.

“I have to warn you, Wonwoo. This ritual is very OTL.”

“I’m prepared,” said the mundane boy, pointing down at his attire, which consisted of sweatpants and a thin shirt. He was ready to sweat if it got him a chance with Mingyu in the long run.

“Then, let’s begin. Can you do backflips?”

“What?”

“Very, very OTL.”

 

***************************

 

Increasingly bored, Chan turned page after page. To him, the grimoire was a very thick but otherwise non-descript book. A bit dusty, maybe somewhat scratched.

Perhaps, he would never have looked inside if he hadn’t known that it was a treasure trove of magical knowledge. On the inside it held all sorts of intriguing - and alarming - drawing and descriptions.

He wondered if this meant that he didn’t judge books by their cover or didn’t want to be judged by the cover himself. The grimoire had an odd way of interpreting the user’s psychology.

Right now he was looking for something to try. Something not related to summoning. He had promised that much and he took promises seriously. At least the ones he meant when he made them.

Most of the book’s content was far above his level. The rest was either boring or way to dangerous. Not dangerous in his eyes, but he knew Seungcheol would tell him to leave his fingers off stuff like duplication and teleportation.

Chan needed something subtle that could fly under the prefect’s radar.

As soon as he realized what he was looking for, the book responded. The dorm’s maknae could sense the pages shifting beneath the one he was currently looking at. Turning to the next one revealed what could become his newest hobby.

 

***************************

 

Timidly, Mingyu knocked at the door to Jihoon’s domain.

“Come in.”

Dragging a duffle bag along, the boy entered with a smile he couldn’t contain. Soon he would have his love potions. Well, technically it was going to be a like-an-awful-lot potion. Baby steps.

The tiny boy stood up from his chair, not gaining much height. Mingyu fought down the lethal urge to pet the pink, fluffy head.

“You got all ingredients?”

“I think so?”

“What did you bring for radiance?”

“A bit of Jeonghan’s shampoo.”

“Ah right. What did you bring for ambivalence?”

“Unicorn tears.”

“Interesting. And for fire?”

“I got Hansol to write me a rap.”

“That should work, I suppose.”

Mingyu handed over the bag with the three aforementioned items and several more. Sunshine in a bottle had the short boy chuckle. He personally would have asked Jeonghan, who could create actual sunshine on command after all, but Mingyu’s mind worked a bit differently it seemed.

Now all was missing were herbs from the school’s collection and a lot of patience.

 

***************************

 

Two sweat drenched boys collapsed on the PCV floor.

While gasping for air with a bone dry throat Wonwoo ran his fingers through his hair, trying to get the sweat greased mess back under control.

“Please...tell me…it’s over.”

Soonyoung, in a sitting position, looked down on his starfishly positioned co-dancer and smiled, his entire face lighting up. “That was fun, wasn’t it?”

“Please…”

“Yes, we’re done.”

“Heck yes.”

Wonwoo swallowed dry, turned from his back on all fours and crawled to the chair that held water bottles. After gulping down as much as a single breath allowed, he felt much less hot and generally better. Still thirsty, still grossly sweaty and every joint was begging for the sweet relieve that only a medically induced coma can provide – but better.

“I told you,” said the blond wizard, “that it’s very-“

“OTL. I know. Wait, did it even work? How do I know if it worked?”

Soonyoung closed his eyes and slowly turned on the spot, his arm stretched as if trying to feel out the air before him. “Yes, I can sense it.”

“Sense what? The artefact?”

“Something like that. It’s calling you to itself.”

“Great,” said Wonwoo, opening another bottle. “Does it have a number I can call it back on?”

“It wants you to find it.”

“Of course, nothing can be easy. Where is it and how vague are the directions?”

The ritual caster opened his eyes. “Exactly 6.24 kilometers to the north and 2.79 to the east from where I’m standing right now.”

“That… is surprisingly and unexpectedly helpful.”

Wonwoo opened the map on his phone and stood up on weak, shivering legs. He would travel there right away. After a long, long shower.

“Ready to take a long, long shower?” asked Soonyoung.

“That is exactly what I thought, like, half a second ago.”

“Let’s go then. I mooched some of Jeonghan’s heavenly shampoo. I think he actually gets it from heaven - haven’t seen it in stores anywhere.”

Wonwoo trailed after his yearmate, led by the arm. “I don’t want people sniffing my hair, though,” he mumbled.

“I’ll only use a little on you. Leaves more for me anyway.”

“Wait, we’re doing each other’s hair?”

“We have to. The shampoo instructions are very…”

“Oh no. No!”

“…OTL.”

 

***************************

 

“Seriously, Chan?”

The prefect was trying to be angry, he really was. But it was difficult. First of all he was too surprised by what was transpiring, secondly he was dead tired and lastly this whole thing was impressive. Even as a mundane guy with nothing beyond tangential knowledge in magic, he had to hand it to the rueful boy.

“Mind control in your first year? This is notoriously difficult stuff. How did you… How?”

Chan blushed and couldn’t hold back a grin, despite his best efforts to fake a remorseful façade, in hopes of propitiating the dorm leader.

“Well,” he hemmed and hawed. “It’s not even good psycho alteration.”

“Oh I can see it’s not good.” Seungcheol was getting his act back together, his eyes drifting to the latest victim of Chan’s juvenile overconfidence.

They all were standing on the school’s roof by the door the leader had just arrived from. The concrete was littered with the usual magical contraptions that sprouted from the ground like antennae. Someone else was with them – at least physically.

Boo Seungkwan was running in circles, flapping his “wings” while using his voice to imitate birdsong.

Seungcheol looked with increasing puzzlement upon the enchanted student. “How long will he think he’s a… what does he think he is?”

“A peacock.”

“Chan! Not in that tone. This is nothing to be proud of.”

“Sorry.”

“So, how long?”

“Um… those alterations can be…”

“Yes?”

“…Permanent”

“Chan!”

Behind them Boo Seungkwan had been climbing the railing. By now he stood right on top of the metal, his make-believe wings ready for flight.

The moment Seungcheol saw what was about to happen, he mumbled a fain “Boo, oh for fu-“

The bird boy jumped, a joyful melody on his lips.

Chan reacted with amazing speed, slicing the air with his wand as soon as the stick jumped into his hand. An exaggerated gesture and the flash of light it evoked later, the roof was filled with a thick, invisible blanket, like an oppressive avalanche of cotton that washed around the dorm leader as the sea around a rock.

With a heavy pull that was not felt physically, but clearly perceived by the boys, the gaseous blanket rushed down the building, speeding by the falling – yet gracefully flapping – Seungkwan.

The boys raced for the railing and gawked down.

Boo was safe and sound, gently deposited on the walkway’s asphalt. He hopped about, on the lookout for bread crumbs.

Oldest and youngest dorm member looked back at each other. Chan’s secure smile died down.

“…Sorry.”

“Just fix him.”

“Yeah, about that…”


	5. Resurrection

 

Mingyu had thought the list of ingredients was long, but compared to the list of instructions it really was just a glorified grocery list. Some of the steps seemed outright impossible.

“Why is all of this so metaphorical?”

Jihoon tore the receipt from Mingyu’s long fingers. “What do you mean? It’s absolutely clear. Death of the moon refers to early morning, the silver utensil is a spoon and by water’s foe it means a Bunsen burner. Well, any fire source, but this is an ancient receipt. With my little modifications we can shave at least an hour off the whole process.”

“Wow, that’s about half a percent of the entire ordeal.”

The fun-sized potions master ignored Mingyu’s tone and began to add one liter of whale-milk to the concoction. One drop at a time.

The tall wizard was already bored out of his skull. It was entirely surreal. If this creation acted as advertised, he would soon be able to make Wonwoo share his feelings to some extent. Was that even okay? Well, no. But as soon as he thought of his longtime friend, he was assaulted by the familiar flurry of conflicting emotions.

He wanted Wonwoo. He wanted to be with him, by his side, but also in between him and anything he had to be protected from, and maybe with his hand entwined with the others.

And yet whenever they were alone, when the chance to confess was freely given, he was blocked by his cowardice.

Was he hoping Wonwoo would take the first step if his feelings became intensified? Was he hoping that the boy with the voice so deep it made Mingyu’s spine shiver would return his longing stares unashamed, provoking a previously unknown courage in him?

That was pretty much how all his fantasies ran their course. He worked up the nerve and in his head he was already halfway there, his words flowing out of his mouth with confidence and poetry. But then he saw Wonwoo’s face – or worse, his smile – and all valor was lost.

The kettle rattled with bubbles rising as Jihoon dipped a poisoned vine repeatedly into the constantly color-changing concoction.

Seokmin crawled out from behind a shelf, his shirt crusted with wet earth, having been on a journey to the back of the room. “Found the herb you needed, but the plant bit me twice.”

“You should have been more careful,” Jihoon simply stated, not even looking up from his pot.

“Well, I didn’t know it could bite.”

“Why do you think it’s called Man-eater rosemary?”

“All plants in this lab have weird names and when- Never mind, can I get a band aid?”

“I’m busy here. Mingyu, first aid is right by my desk.”

Mingyu focused. Once he had the potion he would figure out what to do with it. And what to do about his feelings. Finally, for sure.

 

***************************

 

The bus had taken Wonwoo to the location indicated on his phone. Still, there wasn’t much on the map that resembled a sign saying “free powerful artifacts here”.

He was at the outskirts, in a distinctly picturesque environment. Green rolling hills and ancient trees included. The settlement here was below suburban in density, mostly gardens and closed market stalls. On weekends there might be more happening.

The boy brushed his deep black hair from his forehead and sighed exasperated. Whoever could point him to the tool he needed to win his best friend over was not there – because no one was there. A long journey crammed between mildly gross passengers for nothing.

Wonwoo felt a tap on his shoulder.

As he turned, he found himself eye to eye with a monk in flowing robes.

“Jeon Wonwoo?”

“Y-yes? Do I know you? Do you know me?”

“The scrolls have foretold your coming,” said the bald man. “Please, accompany me.”

The monk gestured to a temple on top of a flat hill. Wonwoo’s heart was beating faster.

“Is this about the artifact?”

“All in due time,” the elder said with a laugh.

Seeing no better options, the boy followed. Was he going to get his object of desire and be on his way? By any chance it wouldn’t be that simple. But if it took a few hours of helping monk with… monk things, he would do so without complaint. Visualizing Mingyu’s face, glistening lips ready to lean in, was enough to make Wonwoo grin and bear pretty much anything.

As he entered the temple area via a little red bridge he blushed at his reflection in the pond below. In hindsight it had been a bad idea to go on a magical quest in his “I hate you” shirt, but it was so comfy.

He could only hope the monk couldn’t read English.

Past several men in similar gorgeously colored robes and into a pagoda off to the side, Wonwoo was glad that none of the others on the grounds seemed to give pay him much attention.

Inside the dingy, incense-stick-smoke filled room were three more monks waiting. The one who had served as a guide took the empty spot place, making them form a corridor from the entrance to the richly decorated gate at the back.

They all stared at the frozen boy with great anticipation.

“The prophecy has come true,” one said.

“The boy must complete the trials,” another added.

“The artifact has called for another master,” said the third.

“Walk without fear,” finally said the original guide.

“O…kay?” Wonwoo didn’t feel confident about this. In fact he very much wanted to tell them thanks-but-no-thanks and turn home.

But he had come so far. And those were monk. They weren’t going to pull out a weapon behind his back once he stepped into the dark room on the other side.

With more bravery than he actually felt he had, the boy walk up to the gate.

 

***************************

 

Seungcheol and Chan waved a tattered loaf of old bread, leading the bird-but-actually-boy down the corridor. Behind the mind control victim were Jun and Jeonghan occasionally looking threatening whenever their captive looked back, making sure he did not turn around and try to escape to the roof again.

This was the third try. Two times the bird named Boo had – under terrible screeching – attempted to flee and could only be brought down by Hansol. The rapper was dressed up in several jackets to make himself big and heavy. He held a towel to throw over poor Boo’s head to calm him down when he tackled him.

In the end the trick was to cover the windows in the corridor to make the bird-boy think it was night time and there was nowhere to fly.

Additionally they had enlisted Jisoo to play something a bird might find relaxing. His attempt to imitate warbling on the guitar was arguably successful but the prolonged exposer to the musician’s gift had the boy’s salivating with a growing lust for chocolate.

Hansol rushed forward and burst the door to the ritual room wide open. “Soonyoung! Help! Soony- Hello?”

The group made it inside, trapping the nervously mincing flightless Boo. But the ritual master was not present.

“Dang, he’s always dancing in here,” Seungcheol exclaimed. “Where can he be at this hour? Everyone else is present and accounted for so- Oh, right.”

 

***************************

 

“Good boy. Gooooood boy.”

Soonyoung rubbed the huge dog’s cheeks, getting drool on his hands. Finally the overexcited canine released the stick.

“You want it?” Waving the stick in front of the sniffing dog’s nose, Soonyoung took a step back ready to throw again.

The dog snapped his head around.

“Huh? What are you seeing?”

Dashing away, the pet disregarded the dancer’s shouts.

“Minghao, no! Minghao, stop! Leave that squirrel in peace. Minghao, you can’t climb a tree like that. You’re gonna get hurt.”

Looking through his pockets, Soonyoung fiddled for the pack of animal crackers. After helping Wonwoo, this break was well deserved but playing fetch was turning into an adventure of its own. Minghao’s fur would need brushing after this. If the shapeshifter turned back into a boy now, his hair would be a mess for weeks.

It looked like he wasn’t going to make it back to the dorm. Surely they could survive without him for a while.

Extending his hand to feed the returned dog, he mumbled. “Let’s get you cleaned up. They’ll live without me.”

 

***************************

 

“We’re dead without Soonyoung.”

Everybody nodded in agreement with their leader. Except Jeonghan who looked pensively upward.

“However…” said the angel.

“Everyone, be quiet,” instructed Seungcheol his already quiet members, “Jeonghan wants to say something. Please, my dear, speak your mind.”

“Well, there is one option we could explore.”

“Ha, how brilliant you are Jeonghan. We can always rely on you. Let’s do it.”

Hansol raised an eyebrow. “Shouldn’t we hear what his idea is before-“

“Poppycock! The angel has a firm grasp on what to do.”

Jeonghan smiled gracefully, as usual not fazed by the prefects affection. “Keeping Seungkwan away from the roof made me remember that the school uses inverted lighting rods to absorb and redirect ambient stray magic. With all what has been going on here lately there is certainly no shortage of energy we could re-redirect – back down.”

This time Jun interrupted, raising not just one but two eyebrows. “I see how it could theoretically work, but… You can’t seriously suggest-?”

“Yes,” the divine messenger said, “shock therapy.”

Jeonghan looked up at the ceiling to where the lightning rods above them would be. Everybody’s head whipped back and forth between the featureless ceiling and each other’s faces. Finally every student’s eyes drifted to Seungkwan who cooed gently in the corner.

Shock therapy it was.


	6. Restauration

 

With the only light coming from small holes in the roof of the cave far above him, Wonwoo felt his way through the cavern in near complete darkness.

His hands gripped every protrusion in the rough rock, clutching tightly to the wall. His feet felt forward inch by inch, along the thin edge that ran along the wall.

How far was the other side? How deep was the fall? If he slipped would he be able to catch himself before vanishing into the abyss?  What waited below? Spikes? A piranha infested river? The skeletons of previous artifact hunters?

Wonwoo kept himself from turning back by mumbling all the reasons he could think of that would motivate him to advance. “MingyuMingyuMingyuMingyuMingyuMingyuMin-“

The edge merged with solid ground. At last he had crossed over.

His hands tapped along the wall faster now, hoping to feel his way to the exit. “Nope, can’t feel anything here. Or here. Got no feel.”

At long last his fingers met some sort of plastic surface. Pressing down on it, revealed it to be a light switch. The cavern became illuminated by neon lights. There was no abyss. The edge had been an ornamental baseboard. The floor was right there.

No one had to know.

Wonwoo entered the cave proper.

 

***************************

 

“One mind repair ritual, coming up. Improvisations notwithstanding.”

Seungcheol had hurried back from the library, having transcribed the relevant part from the grimoire. He had not hurried too much, though. His hair was still styled well and his clothes were not the least bit sweaty. That fact that Jeonghan was present in the room had everything to do with it.

The others got up from the ground were they had been observing Seungkwan’s odd behavior.

“Alright,” Jun said, shoving Boo into the room’s middle. “We need to place the four elements in the four corners around the sacrifice. Sufferer, I meant sufferer! Sorry, old demonic habits are hard to break.”

With a grin that could have been apologetic as well as threatening, the vampire took his position in the north.

Hansol walked rounds, pacing back and forth to keep the warbling boy in line.

Jeonghan stepped into the southern corner of the imagined square on the ritual room floor. He floated slightly above ground, his hair untied, flowing in a non-existent breeze.

Jisoo sat down strumming in the east while Chan, glad to be of use, took his assigned place in the west.

From his position directly below the lightning rods, Seungcheol read once gain over the instructions.

“And this can’t go catastrophically wrong?” he asked into the room, his face displaying no emotion whatsoever. Not that he wanted to doubt or even question Jeonghan, but magic had a tendency to make bad things worse. At least when used by Pledis’ students.

Jun just flashed a quick smile. Jisoo kept playing undisturbed, getting really into it. Chan didn’t even dare to look his elder in the eyes.

So it fell to Jeonghan to respond. “Catastrophically? Perhaps not. Terribly, maybe. But what are you going to do? Tell headmaster-nim?”

“I suppose that would be a good-“

“No, please hyung.” Chan looked up now, eyes wide. ”They’ll kick me out.”

Seungcheol’s poker-face faltered. “Sorry Channie, I have to inform him anyway. This is just too much to keep quiet about. I have to think about Boo, too.”

The maknae hung his head low. He didn’t want to think about what that would mean for him. He had something to make right. He would deal with everything else when it came to it.

“Ready?” asked the angel.

Universal nodding.

The room darkened. Jeonghan shimmered like the reflection of sunlight on water. Jun’s aura simmered with iridescent power. The air cooled down. Seungcheol felt his neck hairs stand up.

He read the text aloud. A mundane like him could – presumably – channel the energy through him and into the square without being effected.

“Light of the north, darkness of the south, music of the east, magic of the west. By your powers combined I am captain defibrillation!”

Lighting is a lot brighter when it’s close. And when it rushes past you inches from your face it is a bit much for your eyes to get used to.

Seungcheol fell backwards as the explosion hit the ground between his feet, a flurry of sparks and particles bursting from the charred floor.

“This ritual was a bad idea,” the leader mumbled through the smoke. “Your beginners level spells are of a really poor quality.”

“What? I am best quality!”

“Seungkwan?”

“Who else?”

Universal cheer.

The prefect raised his hands in triumph, before sinking back to the floor. Could this all be over now?

 

***************************

 

The “T” didn’t fit and he had one “L” left over.

Wonwoo was beginning to doubt his own intelligence. A dozen wood carved Tetromino pieces were waiting for him to be arranged into a rectangle in the world’s least engaging game of Tetris.

Most annoying was the square. It blocked off too much on the sides but if put in a corner it left him with too many lined up spaces.

He was losing his temper, wondering if anyone would complain of he kicked the door open rather than solve this “puzzle”.

Already he had gone through more ridiculous “trials” than he cared to count. A talking statue had let him pass after getting distracted by a paradox. Not a paradox of Wonwoo’s making, mind you. The statue had simply blabbered along and confounded itself in the process. Magical vines blocking the next door had given way to the sound of a lawnmower quickly downloaded to his phone. The ghost who’s tortured past he was supposed to figure out he had simply walked through. Rooming with Jun on occasion had desensitized him a little.

If putting shapes into slots was what finally broke his winning streak he would have to punch someone.

Feeling pretty emo – not that he was in any way an emo – he let his hand slide lazily over the board, wiping the pieces to the side.

The square landed on the four center fields incidentally.

That he hadn’t tried yet. Could he arrange the rest around this equilateral nuisance?

He could.

The door unlocked for him.

 

***************************

 

The sun had long set but in their little laboratory, the trio didn’t know or care.

Softly bubbled the potion, changing its color with excruciating slowness to the desired final hue.

Mingyu was fighting sleep, as he had been for about two hours now. There just wasn’t much more to do other than wait and keep the mixture from thickening too much with the occasional swing of the spoon.

The other boys had left the task to him, preparing the flask in which the potion was destined to reside.

As Mingyu looked at his own reflection on the shifting liquids surface, once more considering his planned deeds. If he managed to intensify Wonwoo’s feelings for him would that make the boy love him back eventually?

Jihoon had been very clear that it was no love potion but enabled Mingyu to take the steps toward building a stronger bond. The rest would still be up to him. Would this be another opportunity he squandered?

The potion master himself returned, holding a color table to the kettle’s content.

A lovely soft pink. That was how the concoction had turned out. Mingyu couldn’t help but notice that it was eerily similar to Jihoon’s hair color. What did he use to dye it? He wouldn’t-?

“It’s finished!” Jihoon exclaimed proudly. “Not bad for a clumsy giant. Fill it up yourself. I’m going to bed. Seokmin, you should shower first, you got a nasty dose of Eternal Itch Thorn on your back when you were under that shelf …Guess I should have mentioned that. Don’t worry, it’s slow to take effect.”

Smiling less brightly now, Seokmin hurried outside. “Good night, friends. See you tomorrow.”

Jihoon glanced over his running experiments one more time and began to open the straps of his overall on his way to the door.

“Don’t forget to turn off the headlights.”

“I won’t. Thank you, Jihoon. You’re the best.”

“Yeah, right.” The shorter boy yawned.

“Really, I owe you.”

“Just don’t make a mess.”

“I won’t. Good night, cutie pie.”

Jihoon trudged through the door. “I’m not cute,” he said cutely, with a cute sleepy voice, too tried to put defiance in his stance.

Mingyu was left alone. With his potion, his hopes, his fears and his tired reflection staring right back at him from the still bubbling cauldron.


	7. Transformation

 

With the only light coming from small holes in the roof of the cave far above him, Wonwoo felt his way through the cavern in near complete darkness.

His hands gripped every protrusion in the rough rock, clutching tightly to the wall. His feet felt forward inch by inch, along the thin edge that ran along the wall.

How far was the other side? How deep was the fall? If he slipped would he be able to catch himself before vanishing into the abyss?  What waited below? Spikes? A piranha infested river? The skeletons of previous artifact hunters?

Wonwoo kept himself from turning back by mumbling all the reasons he could think of that would motivate him to advance. “MingyuMingyuMingyuMingyuMingyuMingyuMin-“

The edge merged with solid ground. At last he had crossed over.

His hands tapped along the wall faster now, hoping to feel his way to the exit. “Nope, can’t feel anything here. Or here. Got no feel.”

At long last his fingers met some sort of plastic surface. Pressing down on it, revealed it to be a light switch. The cavern became illuminated by neon lights. There was no abyss. The edge had been an ornamental baseboard. The floor was right there.

No one had to know.

Wonwoo entered the cave proper.

 

***************************

 

“One mind repair ritual, coming up. Improvisations notwithstanding.”

Seungcheol had hurried back from the library, having transcribed the relevant part from the grimoire. He had not hurried too much, though. His hair was still styled well and his clothes were not the least bit sweaty. That fact that Jeonghan was present in the room had everything to do with it.

The others got up from the ground were they had been observing Seungkwan’s odd behavior.

“Alright,” Jun said, shoving Boo into the room’s middle. “We need to place the four elements in the four corners around the sacrifice. Sufferer, I meant sufferer! Sorry, old demonic habits are hard to break.”

With a grin that could have been apologetic as well as threatening, the vampire took his position in the north.

Hansol walked rounds, pacing back and forth to keep the warbling boy in line.

Jeonghan stepped into the southern corner of the imagined square on the ritual room floor. He floated slightly above ground, his hair untied, flowing in a non-existent breeze.

Jisoo sat down strumming in the east while Chan, glad to be of use, took his assigned place in the west.

From his position directly below the lightning rods, Seungcheol read once gain over the instructions.

“And this can’t go catastrophically wrong?” he asked into the room, his face displaying no emotion whatsoever. Not that he wanted to doubt or even question Jeonghan, but magic had a tendency to make bad things worse. At least when used by Pledis’ students.

Jun just flashed a quick smile. Jisoo kept playing undisturbed, getting really into it. Chan didn’t even dare to look his elder in the eyes.

So it fell to Jeonghan to respond. “Catastrophically? Perhaps not. Terribly, maybe. But what are you going to do? Tell headmaster-nim?”

“I suppose that would be a good-“

“No, please hyung.” Chan looked up now, eyes wide. ”They’ll kick me out.”

Seungcheol’s poker-face faltered. “Sorry Channie, I have to inform him anyway. This is just too much to keep quiet about. I have to think about Boo, too.”

The maknae hung his head low. He didn’t want to think about what that would mean for him. He had something to make right. He would deal with everything else when it came to it.

“Ready?” asked the angel.

Universal nodding.

The room darkened. Jeonghan shimmered like the reflection of sunlight on water. Jun’s aura simmered with iridescent power. The air cooled down. Seungcheol felt his neck hairs stand up.

He read the text aloud. A mundane like him could – presumably – channel the energy through him and into the square without being effected.

“Light of the north, darkness of the south, music of the east, magic of the west. By your powers combined I am captain defibrillation!”

Lighting is a lot brighter when it’s close. And when it rushes past you inches from your face it is a bit much for your eyes to get used to.

Seungcheol fell backwards as the explosion hit the ground between his feet, a flurry of sparks and particles bursting from the charred floor.

“This ritual was a bad idea,” the leader mumbled through the smoke. “Your beginners level spells are of a really poor quality.”

“What? I am best quality!”

“Seungkwan?”

“Who else?”

Universal cheer.

The prefect raised his hands in triumph, before sinking back to the floor. Could this all be over now?

 

***************************

 

The “T” didn’t fit and he had one “L” left over.

Wonwoo was beginning to doubt his own intelligence. A dozen wood carved Tetromino pieces were waiting for him to be arranged into a rectangle in the world’s least engaging game of Tetris.

Most annoying was the square. It blocked off too much on the sides but if put in a corner it left him with too many lined up spaces.

He was losing his temper, wondering if anyone would complain of he kicked the door open rather than solve this “puzzle”.

Already he had gone through more ridiculous “trials” than he cared to count. A talking statue had let him pass after getting distracted by a paradox. Not a paradox of Wonwoo’s making, mind you. The statue had simply blabbered along and confounded itself in the process. Magical vines blocking the next door had given way to the sound of a lawnmower quickly downloaded to his phone. The ghost who’s tortured past he was supposed to figure out he had simply walked through. Rooming with Jun on occasion had desensitized him a little.

If putting shapes into slots was what finally broke his winning streak he would have to punch someone.

Feeling pretty emo – not that he was in any way an emo – he let his hand slide lazily over the board, wiping the pieces to the side.

The square landed on the four center fields incidentally.

That he hadn’t tried yet. Could he arrange the rest around this equilateral nuisance?

He could.

The door unlocked for him.

 

***************************

 

The sun had long set but in their little laboratory, the trio didn’t know or care.

Softly bubbled the potion, changing its color with excruciating slowness to the desired final hue.

Mingyu was fighting sleep, as he had been for about two hours now. There just wasn’t much more to do other than wait and keep the mixture from thickening too much with the occasional swing of the spoon.

The other boys had left the task to him, preparing the flask in which the potion was destined to reside.

As Mingyu looked at his own reflection on the shifting liquids surface, once more considering his planned deeds. If he managed to intensify Wonwoo’s feelings for him would that make the boy love him back eventually?

Jihoon had been very clear that it was no love potion but enabled Mingyu to take the steps toward building a stronger bond. The rest would still be up to him. Would this be another opportunity he squandered?

The potion master himself returned, holding a color table to the kettle’s content.

A lovely soft pink. That was how the concoction had turned out. Mingyu couldn’t help but notice that it was eerily similar to Jihoon’s hair color. What did he use to dye it? He wouldn’t-?

“It’s finished!” Jihoon exclaimed proudly. “Not bad for a clumsy giant. Fill it up yourself. I’m going to bed. Seokmin, you should shower first, you got a nasty dose of Eternal Itch Thorn on your back when you were under that shelf …Guess I should have mentioned that. Don’t worry, it’s slow to take effect.”

Smiling less brightly now, Seokmin hurried outside. “Good night, friends. See you tomorrow.”

Jihoon glanced over his running experiments one more time and began to open the straps of his overall on his way to the door.

“Don’t forget to turn off the headlights.”

“I won’t. Thank you, Jihoon. You’re the best.”

“Yeah, right.” The shorter boy yawned.

“Really, I owe you.”

“Just don’t make a mess.”

“I won’t. Good night, cutie pie.”

Jihoon trudged through the door. “I’m not cute,” he said cutely, with a cute sleepy voice, too tried to put defiance in his stance.

Mingyu was left alone. With his potion, his hopes, his fears and his tired reflection staring right back at him from the still bubbling cauldron.


	8. Metadynamics

 

These monks hoard some weird stuff, thought Wonwoo.

Among the objects on the altar were a skull, a flattened squirrel, an orange (fresh), a bottle of champagne, an ornamental saber, an orange (dry), a trashy romance novel from 1986 and more.

Were any of these the artifact? Was he supposed to arrange them somehow? Had he reached the part were puzzles weren’t self-explanatory anymore?

It wasn’t as if everything was garbage. Some items were valuable. The sword for example. And there was a crown, and a belt full of gems. Then there was a purse of antique coins and-

Wonwoo squinted. Was that a beanie?

A simple, gray beanie, right there in the heap. Now that he thought about it, the room was a bit chilly. He’d put it back after he was done.

Without thinking, the boy pulled the headwear over his hair, still trying to make sense of the pile in front of him.

“He Who Is Prophesized Has Chosen.”

The face in the stone looked at Wonwoo with eyes made of shining diamonds, its rocky lips moving.

“As The Scrolls Have Foretold, The Boy With The Emo Shirt Has Elected the Artifact.”

“Hey, I’m not emo,” Wonwoo said, instinctively covering his shirt with his slender arms.

The wooden panels along the sides opened, revealing themselves to be hidden doors. Monks streamed into the hall. So anyone could just walk in here whenever they felt like it? At least he wouldn’t have to go back the way he came.

The original monk who had guided Wonwoo into this mess stepped forward. “The chosen one has arrived.”

“Please stop that and I’m not emo.”

Monk number one spread his arms. “By choosing the artifact from the mountain of treasures-“

Mountain? Treasures? Were they seeing the same thing?

“-you have proven yourself,” the bald man continued, “worthy to be the wielder of the beanie of power. Now continue your journey and spread the joy your gift can bestow on others.”

“Um, how exactly?”

“Rub it.”

“What?”

“Rub the beanie.”

“O…kay.”

For several minutes Wonwoo was forced to stay and receive awkward hugs from the monks who seemed overjoyed that the chosen one had arrived, before he could allow himself to say goodbye. Not without subscribing to the temple’s electronic newsletter, but that was a small price for his freedom.

He-who-isn’t-emo was able to leave at long last, the magical beanie warming his ears on the bus ride home.

 

***************************

 

Jeonghan was back, but Seungcheol was still sulking. Not that Jun had much of an idea what to do about that situation. Not when he was still busy trying to get Seungkwan engaged in the most tedious game of monopoly the school had ever seen.

Seokmin and Hansol did their part, but nothing seemed to distract the flightless boy from his perceived disability. He didn’t want to sing, play or even eat. Jun was getting seriously worried.

Hansol landed on a field with a hotel and groaned, counting the money he’d have to pay Jun.

Jeonghan walked by, likely on the way to the kitchen. Jun intercepted him with his superhuman reflexes. “Do you have a minute to brighten someone’s day? Seungkwan has been a bit depressed lately.”

“I see,” the angel said, “I’m going to pay a visit to heaven. Don’t know how long exactly. But I have a moment. What can I do?”

“Well, now that you’re in front of me, I remember that your wings are freshly polished.”

“They sure are.”

Jeonghan spread his celestial appendices that somehow went right through the fabric of his clothes without breaking it. He fluttered timidly, as to now blow the monopoly money off the table. Seungkwan looked on with unconcealed envy.

Jun leaned in, whispering conspiratorially. “Boo is sad because he can’t fly. The whole bird thing, you know. Take him for a few rounds maybe?”

The angel chuckled. “I can do even better.”

Winking at Jun, Jeonghan stepped up to Seungkwan and took the younger boy’s hand into his. “Stand up my friend. I won’t need these while I’m in heaven. It’s a loan for a day or two.”

Putting his other hand on Boo’s shoulder, the angel enveloped them both in ethereal light, making the other mundanes avert their eyes.

When the charm was completed and the lights had faded, the wings had switched their owner. On their new host they looked quite different. Gone was the dove-like appearance of homogenous purity, exchanged for all the colors of a peacock’s tail.

Laughter returned to Seungkwan’s face, who shed a tear of joy, thanking Jeonghan profusely. The rest of the group only stared in awe as Seungkwan ran out the door, swinging his new limbs with curious vigor.

All monopoly money made it to the floor. Hansol sighed in relief.

The last thing they all heard was the re-birdified boy humming pop songs. Even Jun and his explosive reflexes took a moment to catch up. Seconds of silent stares later the boys burst up from the table and ran after the mood switched singer.

It wasn’t every day you got to see someone learn to fly – and maybe fall on his face hilariously.

 

***************************

 

Wonwoo arrived back home wishing he could go to bed right away, but it was early in the morning and he didn’t want people to think he was a sloth. Of course he was a sloth and people knew, but you could only be so charming before everyone told you to stop being lazy. He intended to do the bare minimum of interaction necessary and then start a series of naps, strategically distributed across the day and building to appear not above average lazy to any one particular person.

Did you think being a charismatic sloth was easy? No, it was all about careful calculations and cunning schemes. Wonwoo had it all figured out.

A group of boys ran past him making excited boy noises. There were some feathers and game money floating after them.

Around the corner sat Seungcheol, being miserable.

“Hyung, what’s going on?”

The leader looked up with empty eyes. “What am I doing wrong? Am I unlovable?”

“Um…”

That was heavy. Wonwoo considered what to say but soon face palmed on the inside. The beanie! But how was he supposed to use it on anybody? Rub the beanie while wearing it? While the other person wore it? Take the thing off and rub it on the other guy?

In the end he decided to simply plop the headwear over Seungcheol’s head and ruffle his hair as if he was drying it with a towel.

The prefect forgot his sorrows for a moment and was loudly perplexed.

“Stop it, Wonwoo! Wonwhat are you doing? Wonwho gave you permission? I wonwon’t let you ruin my hair.”

“Still making puns, huh?” the younger boy said while continuing to mess up his elder’s mop. If this didn’t work as intended at least the leader was smiling again.

Eventually Wonwoo let off, his attacks ceasing. He sat next to Seungcheol and waited for anything indicating that a change had taken place. The older boy was sulking again. And they call me emo, Wonwoo thought.

Seconds later Jeonghan appeared.

“Hey Wonwoo, could you leave us alone for a moment?”

“Sure…”

Putting his beanie back on, Wonwoo walked around the corner - but not further - fully intending to hear what was coming next.

“Listen, Cheollie…”

“Jeonghan, I’m sorry if-“

“No, no. It’s fine. I thought about that I said earlier and… I realized I may have been a bit harsh.”

Wonwoo was dying to see their expressions, but didn’t dare to look. He didn’t even dare to breathe. Seungcheol must still be sitting on the ground, he thought, arms around himself. Or perhaps now leaning upright against the wall. The angel was likely leaning on the opposite side of the corridor.

“Cheollie, I just realized seconds ago that I… I’d like to spend some time with you. Since I’m going to heaven for a little while I thought… I mean, if you want, why not come with?”

“S-seriously?”

The angel chuckled quietly but said nothing. Wonwoo assumed he had made a gesture since “Cheollie” rose to his feet.

They went in the opposite direction together, away from Wonwoo’s position and so the boy risked a glance around the corner. He saw their hands brush up against each other just as they slipped through a door.

Resounding success.

Wonwoo jumped with every alternate step on the way to his first nap location in an untypically joyous manner.

Chan came the same way.

“Hey Channie.”

“Oh, hyung. You’re back?”

“Yes, I was in... it’s complicated, but I got a cool beanie out of it.”

“I’m going outside. Seungkwan is trying to fly and he already smashed into two trees and a lamp post. I can’t miss that.”

“Be on your way then. Oh, and Seungcheol is visiting heaven with Jeonghan, so he won’t be here for a while. Ask me if you need anything. But not now, I’m going to take a nap until it’s time for my next nap.”

“Seungcheol is gone?”

“Yes. Why are you grinning like that? You’re scaring me.”

“No reason. See you later.”

“Bye… wait that’s not the way outside. Where are you going?”

“Summon- …Ritual- …I mean, I just forgot something in my room. Later.”


	9. Summoning

 

There was only one place Mingyu hadn’t searched yet. He trampled up the stairs to the attic – potion in his pocket – and looked around. It was unlikely, but certainly possible that Wonwoo was taking a nap up there, where nobody would disrupt his slumber.

Stepping over empty boxes, he softly called Wonwoo’s name.

 

***************************

 

Wonwoo picked his first spot in the common room. If Mingyu showed up by coincidence he would rub his beanie. With a warm fuzzy feeling of anticipation he drifted into a gentle sleep.

After laying down he remembered that his phone was dead, but getting up to plug it in seemed like less of a priority now that he was already wrapped into fluffy blankets.

 

***************************

 

After searching even the basement, Mingyu conceded. Wonwoo was simply not in the building. He went back to his room and sent another text message which got no answer as had all the ones before. He began to wonder how this was going to end if he was already this clingy before their relationship had even started. But he had a clear reason for finding his crush, making the situation more urgent.

The tall wizard spent his time hunching over homework, looking at his phone every few minutes in the unlikely case he had overheard the text message ring tone.

 

***************************

 

The next spot was going to be his own dorm room. Wonwoo left the common room, saying his goodbyes to the present company to evoke the impression that he was fully rested and about to do some work. He took the beanie off when he reached his room and fell right into bed.

He’d go find Mingyu later. Daydreaming about the possibilities his new artifact might allow was almost better than doing it for real. A giddy anticipation encased his tired mind.

 

***************************

 

Mingyu went back into the common room. If his best friend showed up it would certainly be here.

He was facing a problem. The mixture in his pocket not only looked like milk but went bad in very much the same way. If Wonwoo didn’t run across him soon, Mingyu would have to find a way of cooling it down.

Casting a spell on it was no option. Potions and charms interacted unpredictably.

 

***************************

 

Thirdly, there was the lab. Not a good place for a nap in general, but Wonwoo knew for sure that it was empty that very moment. If he slipped in now and fell asleep quickly, anyone entering would think he had studied diligently and became tired over his work. Genius.

 

***************************

 

Mingyu decided to take a quick glance into Wonwoo’s room, just in case the boy had returned and gone right to sleep, but he found it as empty as before.

That was about as long as he could afford to wait.

The wizard entered the kitchen. Weird noises came from the ritual room below but that wasn’t unusual. Likely Soonyoung had talked the entire class into practicing something novel and amazing. Mingyu was glad to be one year below the master-dancer so he only had to do the required – and simple – rituals the curriculum demanded.

A group of students from another dorm was stuck to the window, their faces figuratively glued to the glass. Seungkwan was flying rounds outside. Whenever he passed by the kitchen, the students cheered. Someone was taking the time.

Mingyu wondered what the record speed for human self-propelled flight was. If there was such a thing.

The uppermost shelf in the fridge was reserved for Jihoon’s experiments since many potions required to be kept cool.

After drawing a heart on the bottle to make sure he could find it again – Jihoon would never draw a heart – he stowed the magic drink away and made himself a snack.

 

***************************

 

Wonwoo looked up, rudely awoken from his slumber. Disturbing noises were coming from above where the ritual room was. Odd, Soonyoung’s class wasn’t until later today.

Looking around he saw the other students in the lab similarly concerned. Everybody glanced at the ceiling, wondering if they should send someone to ask what was going on.

Since nobody rose to the occasion, Wonwoo decided that it was time to switch nap spots at any rate so he might as well appear busy for a moment.

He turned to the students whose names he didn’t know or recall. “I’m just going to hop upstairs and tell them to keep it down if that’s okay with you all.”

Wonwoo rubbed the sand form his eyes while making his way to the door with wobbly steps. Oh, right: The beanie. He had used the headwear as pillow and forgotten to put it back on. He turned back, about to grab his magical fashion item when-

 

***************************

 

Mingyu shoved the last bites into his mouth all at once, enjoying the taste of the ingredients mixing together and filling him up. He stood up to get seconds when-

 

***************************

 

Seungcheol tightly held onto his beloved angel’s hip, drowning in the sparkling eyes he couldn’t stop looking at. The unearthly odor of Jeonghan’s supernal shampoo numbed his mind like a gentle hand putting warm blankets around all his sorrows.

“Ready to ascend, Cheollie hyung?”

“With you I’d go anywhere.”

A soft light came from the sky and drenched the duo in front of the school entrance in an orange glow. The boys tensed up to be pulled into heaven when-

 

***************************

 

-when the school exploded.

 

***************************

 

A pillar of fire shot through the ground into the kitchen, bits and pieces of the floor dropping into the infernal space below. Mingyu whipped out his wand and cast the safety teleport charm, getting himself out of harm’s way as the flames crept up on him.

Wonwoo was thrown to the ground by the might of pressurized air as the ceiling broke open and liquid, burning metal dropped onto the lab tables. With high pitched screams the lab students rushed outside, Wonwoo in their midst.

Outside, Seungcheol sighed. The flames reached across the whole front of the building, radiating away from the ritual room, charring the walls.

From the inferno, a creature burst forth. A massive dog, carrying a slumped shape on his back. The dog landed with a heavy thump on the asphalt and slithered a few meters.

All around Seungcheol student’s teleported from the building, many bringing mundane friends out with them. Above their heads the winged Seungkwan flew back and forth between the windows looking for trapped people and directing wizards to rescue those individuals.

Seungcheol tried to count and see if all his dorm buddies had made it out. Almost everybody was accounted for. Only Chan and Minghao were still missing.

The dog turned back, revealing himself to be the missing Chinese boy. The smoking cloth pile on his back contained a timid little boy who spotted Seungcheol and immediately averted his eyes.

“Chan!”

“…Hyung, I thought you were gone.”

“I was. Almost.”

“Sorry.”

“What did you do?”

“I summoned…”

“You summoned what?”

The rising flames licked along the schools walls, finding each other and combined into a vague shape. Second after second the fire took on a more solid, physical quality. A column of orange, hot, ethereal matter reaching from the lab to the dorm’s kitchen across three levels took on the shape of a radiant man with multiple limbs.

The fire demon began to climb onto the roof, leaving a half collapsed building beneath it.

“M-Mingyu?”

Finally, Wonwoo, now wide awake, had spotted his best friend in the crowd. But to his dismay the beanie was somewhere in the burning part of the building. Mingyu didn’t seem too happy either, looking crestfallenly in the direction of the kitchen. Wonwoo could only assume the boy had lost access to a well prepared snack the moment the school went to hell. Or hell came to the school.

“Mingyu!

At last the tall boy heard his friend shout his name.

“Wonwoo, there you are. I was looking for you.”

“Yeah, sorry. I was napping.”

“Where?”

“In all sorts of strategic locations.”

“Oh.”

“You weren’t there in the morning.”

“I know, I was out all night at a… Doesn’t matter now.”

Around them, wizard students and teachers began to fire beams of icy spells at the growling, horned creature that crouched on the roof, spreading heat.

Mingyu looked back and forth between the ground and Wonwoo’s face.

“Um… I had something prepared for… I guess I’ll have to do this the hard way. There is something you should know and I want you to hear the whole story. You may not approve and now that you’re in front of me I don’t know how I could ever think what I was planning was okay … or necessary. Wonwoo, I hope you will take this the right way. I lo-“

Seungcheol hit Mingyu in the back. “Why aren’t you firing? Come on!”

Puzzled, both boys didn’t know how to process this. Until they remembered that the school was under attack and Mingyu was still holding his wand.

Joining the array of blue beams and projectiles the wizard had to focus and gave Wonwoo a window to speak.

Tugging the hem of his “I Hate You” shirt nervously the boy spoke with a shaky voice. “I’ll let you finish in a moment, but I have something to say, too. Please, don’t hate me but I tried to do something really manipulative. It was a bad idea, I realize that now, but I only did it because... Because, Kim Mingyu I’m in lo-“

The force of Seungcheol’s hit almost sent him down on his back. Wonwoo clung to the red cylinder that his leader had slammed into his arms. A fire extinguisher.

“Come on!” yelled the leader before simply dragging the unresponsive boy along, closer to the flames.

Wonwoo took the courage he had prepared for Mingyu and applied them to the work before him. In one row with other students he battled the flames, allowing the wizards more area for combat.

Maybe, he thought, it was better this way. As he looked back to see the boyfriend of his dreams - and the best friend of his waking life – Wonwoo felt his resolution leaving him. Maybe it wasn’t meant to be. The thought hurt. He wasn’t sure if the tears in his eyes came from walking into blistering air, but he was sure that he felt defeat. The loss of his hard earned artifact was nothing in comparison.

 

***************************

 

Mingyu couldn’t really spare a thought or else his charm might have wavered. The demon clawed away at the roof, hoping to get inside the attic. But the counterspells were already working. The creature had shrunken to half its previous size.

For a second the wizard boy allowed himself to reflect on the turbulent tempest ranting and raving in his heart. In the literal heat of the moment he had come so very close to confessing. Should he try again later? Perhaps this was a sign to stay quiet and put the issue to rest.

Except Mingyu wasn’t sure he could. Too strong was the urge to hold Wonwoo. To touch and caress him. Even now as the mundane boy was getting black with ash and his fringe sweatily stuck to his forehead.

If the courage had left him again, he would just have to find another way. Magic had to offer more than one option.

“I’ll get him to see me,” Mingyu mumbled. “To see me the way I see him. I need him to like me, to care for me. No, more! I need him to feel the way I feel about him. I need him to _adore me_.”

 

 

[ _Believe it or not, this fic was originally supposed to end right here. Cruel, I know. But then, I couldn't stop myself, I had to add a second arc. Lucky you._ _Drop me a comment. Even if you think you have nothing to say, just tell me what made you laugh or cry. It's my greatest joy._ ]

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll upload the second half in a few days. Stay tuned.


	10. Spiritualism

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AO3 doesn't allow formatting as pretty as AFF but it'll do. Sigh.

Despite the ample use of magic, the repairs to the school would not be finished for some time. Still, education had to happen and so the regular operations were resumed as soon as possible. Where structures were too damaged by the demon fire – and had to undergo lengthy decontamination – classes were outsourced.

Mingyu had passed the charred corridors that once led to classrooms on his way to the library, quite glad that several regiments of students were deployed at locations far away – on permanent class trips so to speak.

This left him alone in the room overflowing with books. Once again he intended to consult the grimoire, but this time with much less of a clear goal in mind. Well, his final aim had not changed, but he wasn’t going to keep looking for a potion to solve his problems.

The like-a-lot brew he had created not long ago had only seen one use. It was a datapoint of one, but Seungcheol had gotten terribly sick from it. At least he couldn’t think of any better explanation. Jeonghan had told him that the dorm leader had basically puked his way through heaven, tainting their divine holyday quite a bit.

Mingyu didn’t feel too guilty. Seungcheol reveled in the attention his angelic crush bestowed upon his sick self.

Now however, the tall boy started opening the grimoire and his thoughts drifted back to his own problems. Once he made it past the warning pages that couldn’t be skipped, he focused his thoughts, hoping the book would just read his mind, even though he was aware that it didn’t quite work that way.

“How can I make Wonwoo fall for me? How can I gather the courage to ask him out? Is there no way magic can help me? Answer me you waste of paper.”

With a deep sigh, he resigned to his fate and pulled up a chair. He’d have to read a lot of English, searching page after page for some obscure or difficult charm that his formal magical education had skipped. And by now he was pretty sure the book showed itself to him in English just to spite him personally.

As soon as he opened the translator app he didn’t feel like reading anymore. Why did magic have to be such a chore?

With his head buried in his hands, Mingyu’s fingers softly brushed his own hair left and right in a comfort gesture.

“I just want him,” he whispered. “I adore him so much. I want him to adore me, too.”

Paper rustled. A soft indoor breeze gave Mingyu goosebumps. The light flickered and a deep humming sound filled the air.

It was the air conditioning unit, breaking down as it sometimes did. The huge, antiquated air vents pumped air to – or from? – the room in a highly inefficient manner. Wasn’t there a spell for this or something?

Anyway, Mingyu looked back down at the book in front of him… and gasped. The page had changed. With some difficulty, he worked through the text. But the title alone sped up his heartbeat.

**ADORE-ME (AMULETT)**

**1.1.1a History**

The amulet of _[illegible demonic runes]_ , commonly called the “Adore Me” (henceforth AM), is an underworldly talisman (see page 12, list of talismans) embedded into a magically hardened gold plate (see page 56a, strengthening solids) to form an amulet that can be worn indefinitely (see page 93/sup-page 9b for wearable magic).

The AM was created by the horrifying blacksmiths of _[more demon runes]_ within the terrible chasm of _[runes again]_ , forged through the abominable process of _[many, many runes]_ under the rule of ultra-demonic god-emperor Travis (see page -12.5 for list of underworld rulers, [negative pages inaccessible in overworld]).

Mingyu took a risk and skipped a few paragraphs until he found the section with a title to his liking.

**1.4.1 Use**

The AM has the property of causing one sentient being to adore one other. This process is completely controllable by the one in possession of the AM and has never been reported to fail.

The boy skimmed his way through more sections – many more than could have fit on the page by conventional physics - until he found the one he desperately searched for.

**3.1b Whereabouts**

Although the AM has been broken in half (see Section 2.1.3 and 2.4.1 through 2.4.97) each half has retained the power of the full amulet. Only one half is known to still exist for certain. The right one. It is located in the Valley of Crimson (see page 5xv4Pgr for a map [to access map, invert geometry of universe leftward]).

Mingyu took a quick glance down to see what page he was on. The number was nine digits long. He would never find this page again. Perhaps he was the first human to ever see it. He carefully transcribed all relevant information in a post-it and ran back to his dorm.

Now he only needed to go to hell.

 

*************************

 

The class wasn’t complete. Only wizards and similarly magical beings exited the bus – mundane students learning about algebra somewhere in a container.

Soonyoung hopped off the vehicle and stretched his sore limbs. “Woah,” he said without hesitation. “So pretty.”

The beach ahead was beautiful. Sunlight bouncing off the gently moving ocean, sending shimmers across the majestic scenery.

“Bit too chilly to go swimming,” mumbled Jun. The vampire wore a huge cap to shield his eyes from the sun. The massive shades did their part, too.

Jeonghan got off the bus last, all other students spreading out as he opened his wings. He didn’t like to be crammed into a bus seat on the best of days, but since he had lend his wings to Seungkwan for the duration of his holyday a little while back, he was extra careful with his glistening white appendages. He still occasionally complained about having gotten his wings back with a few feathers crooked.

”We wouldn’t go swimming anyway. We have an objective. And I for my part fully intend to comply with the assignment to achieve my academic potential. If you were more like me I wouldn’t have to keep you in line all the time.”

Just as the angel had finished reprimanding his classmates, who habitually hadn’t listened, the teacher gave instructions. Groups of three. Well, that was easily arranged.

Soonyoung, Jun and Jeonghan were soon on their way to the beach, walking along the shore to find a good spot for the day’s lecture: sand manipulation.

Far from the rest of the students, the trio got to work. Soonyoung used a wand, the others didn’t have to. Walls rose from the ground, white and golden, as silicates joined together into a solid structure.

Towers with thin, gothic windows; battlements along the outer wall; turrets along the inner construction; three floors of grandeur. The castle was a reflection of the caster’s minds. And as such, it wasn’t finished. Ladder horn snail shells grew impossibly to decorate the towers; conches adorned the entrance; and a thousand mother of pearl splitters from the ocean lined the walls.

Blowing on his smoking wand, Soonyoung looked behind them. They had walked far from the rest of their class but with some squinting he could see what was going on. Other groups had created small arches, small pillars or, at best, life sized statues.

“Did you guys lay it on a bit thick, maybe?”

The supernatural creatures shrugged in unison. Soonyoung, still cooling his wand, decided that he would just take the A+ and not question it. This was truly a magnificent fortress.

As the boys explored the inside, their stray magic found its way into the sea. Little critter began to grow a bit… and a bit more. Big, meaty claws picked up a seaweed wrapped stick. Crustacean brains kicked into gear.

 

*************************

 

Mingyu had vacated the library abruptly.

The grimoire had not been closed.

Rustling, ever rustling, paper grew. More pages spawned. Some expanded in size – more scroll than page.

Paper spilled onto the ground. Paper spread out between the shelves. Paper took hold like ancient roots, wiggled like kraken arms, twisted like oak twigs in the wind.

Ever rustling, _evermore rustling_ , the tentacles of bleached and bent and coffee stained and folded and drawn on and unread paper vines grew into a forest.

Tendrils reached into the air vents.

 

*************************

 

Wonwoo had been too lazy to unsubscribe from the newsletter of the temple where he had gotten his prophesized artefact. As he saw the promotional mail arrive on his laptop, he briefly wondered if he should confess that the powerful beanie had fallen victim to a flaming beast from hell.

Nah, too much work. He’d just add the mail address to the spam filter.

But… he should at least read the mail. Maybe it was worthwhile.

It turned out to be advertisement. Of course.

He scratched his beanie – not a magical one – or rather, he scratched his hair through his headwear. The monks were having an exhibition of spiritual items from all over the world. Good for them. Still, Wonwoo wasn’t going to leave the dorm just to look at dusty old stuff. He had learned that the monks had an odd sense of what was valuable – or remotely sensible.

But that picture! Those runes were demonic. They had an actual magical object at their exhibition.

Wonwoo read the item description. “The Adore-Me amulet has been known to give its user the power to make any other person adore them. It was broken long ago and only the left half could be saved in a private collection. Now, for the first time, it is available to view for the general public.”

He needed the amulet. But first he had to make sure he knew what he was getting into. But how to look it up? In the library? No, too much effort. The internet was a great source for obscure magical lore. Or, at least, sufficient. Sometimes.

 

*************************

 

The uppermost floor. Dark hardwood shelves bursting of folders. A massive desk. A tablet computer next to an astrolabe. A sliver sigil on the chest pocket of the strict man’s suit. “Pledis School” in shining letters.

“Chan, Chan, Chan.”

The headmaster had a busy schedule, but this student demanded personal attention. Now that the rebuilding was mostly organized, the headmaster finally had the time to tend to this particular problem case.

“Chan, I have held conference about your… incident with… well, with everybody.”

He really had. Meeting the Council Concerning Criminal Conjurations and the School Advisory Board had turned into consulting the High Tribune and the Association of Twilight. He had even spoken to the Greater Gabfest.

They all had told him the same. And the very thought of it seemed to make his tie constrict around his neck.

“It’s okay, headmaster,” said Chan, very quietly, “I’ve already packed. You’ll never hear from me again. I’m so very sorry. I’ll… well, I wish I could say that there’s a way for me to make up for all this. When do I have to have moved out? I’d like to say goodbye to a few-“

“No, Chan.” The headmaster, buried his head in his hands and took a deep breath before meeting the boy’s eyes again. “There’s no place you’d be less dangerous. You are talented, almost to a fault. Everyone agreed on one thing: You’d only be a ticking time bomb if you escape our supervision.”

“So…”

“You stay.”

Chan jumped, causing the principal to step back with in irrational touch of fear on his face.

“Mansae!” the boy yelled.

“Alright, calm down. You are not to leave the school grounds without my personal permission. And you have to leave your wand in a safe place.”

“Of course. But what safe place?”

“I will install a locker in your bedroom. Like a weapon’s locker, but forged from reinforced mithril-titanium alloy. The safe will be delivered in three to twelve workdays. In the meanwhile put your wand on a high shelf. Don’t even think about using it.”

“No wand, got it.”

“Alright. You are dismiss- Ah!”

Chan made the half circle around the desk and hugged the headmaster tightly, ignoring the man’s struggles to escape like a cat that didn’t want to be petted anymore.

“Don’t worry, principal-nim. I’ll just reread all my dinosaur books. No magic at all. You have nothing to worry about.”

“I have plenty… to worry about. And… I can’t breathe… Chan... Stop it.”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we go again. Compete with magical artefact plot device, obligatory beach episode and an excited Chan.   
> *whispers* And a suffering Seungcheol.  
> I hope the second arc is as well received as the first one. Brownie points to anyone who sees the Spongebob reference.


	11. Runology

 

“Hey Hansol. Do you know how I can go to hell?”

“Why you asking me?”

The rapper was rolling around on the common room sofa, surrounded by lose notebook pages, scribbles all over. Mingyu hadn’t asked him for any specific reason, he had just been the first guy the wizard had come across.

“Well, you spit fire, no?”

“Rapping doesn’t make me a dragon.”

“Alright, I’ll figure it out.”

“Wait,” Hansol said and sat up. He fixed his hair, putting the oversized cap on backwards again. “What do you want to do in hell?”

“Uh, just something I’d like to pick up. In the…uh, Crimson Valley.”

“Jun probably knows. He’s from there after all.”

“Yeah, I guessed, but he’s not gonna be back until later. Thanks anyway.”

Hansol rubbed his temples and started collecting his notes. “…Actually, I think the Woozler sometimes pays a visit to the underworld. He’d fit right in there, come to think of it. And as far as I know he visits the valleys of every color. Rare herbs that only grow blablabla.”

“Oh, I’ll ask him right away. Thank you.”

“Anytime, hyung.”

Mingyu walked away, eager to speak to Jihoon again. Not eager enough to run, though. Despite having worked fruitfully with the potion’s master before, he had no plans to disturb the pink haired boy unless unavoidable.

 

*************************

 

Chan’s wand was on the top shelf. It was not in his hand and would not get there no matter how much his fingers twitched. He had sworn that much.

It had appeared in his hand - all on its own - occasionally, but that wasn’t his fault. Wands wanted to be used. Technically calling one’s wand was considered summoning, but it wasn’t his doing, so he declared himself innocent. He even put the magic stick back on the shelf every time it popped up in his hand, diligently.

True to his word he was doing his best to distract himself. He had built a pillow fortress on his bed, made from his own pillows and those belonging to other dorm members. But they weren’t going to miss them until bedtime, so again, he didn’t think of himself as committing an injustice.

Chan was huddled up with comics, coloring books and dinosaur lexica. He had found that it was necessary to keep his fingers busy, and even though coloring books were meant for slightly younger demographics, they helped with his “condition”.

And indeed, he hadn’t summoned anything so far.

Having reread the pages on his favorite, obscure dinos a few times left him bored. Which was dangerous. He began instead to doodle on the Tyrannosaurus page.

Mr. T-Rex got glasses and a toupee, Ms. T-Rex soon held a purse and wore stilettos. The Compsognathus got a beard and the Pterodactyl a flowing mane.

Then his mind drifted again and the doodles turned abstract. A line here, a curve there, just whatever Chan’s subconscious supplied. He didn’t realized his mistake until it was too late.

The book burst into flames. They were of a harmless, blue burning, magefire. Regardless, the boy yelled in surprise and kicked the book away from himself. Flickering in all directions to spite gravity, the fire shot sparks into the room. The air ionized and Chan crawled deeper into his fortress.

White smoke – more liquid than gaseous – rose from the pages and amalgamated in the middle of the room.

The first year boy dared to look on but not to move. The smoke ball exploded with an infernal boom.

Still frozen in place, Chan tried to understand what had happened. Eventually he crawled forward, leaving his pillow construct behind. Now that he looked closely he saw to his terror that the scribbles he had so absentmindedly created were perfect summoning runes. He hadn’t even know that he could draw them for memory – or anyone else.

Furthermore the regular doodles – like glasses, wigs and manes – were still there. But three of the dinosaurs were missing! Gone from the paper.

The wand jumped off the shelf and right into the boy’s twitching hand. No, he had to stay strong. He threw the stick onto his desk, still fixated on the book in front of him. He would prove that he could leave his wand behind. Erasing pictures from a library book wasn’t much of a crime. Maybe he could simply draw the dinosaurs back on. He had memorized them well enough.

A shadow darkened the room from outside the window.

With a lump forming in his throat, Chan turned around, staring out the window with widening eyes.

T-Rex stared back.

He had summoned dinosaurs.

Chan screamed.

 

*************************

 

Seungcheol held his ear to the wall. Where were these rustling noises coming from? It was as if somebody was making a thousand paper airplanes at once. He didn’t expect this to be the answer to the riddle but at Pledis School you never knew. One time he had found Chan almost drowning in a room filled with origami cranes of magical origin.

The prefect shook his head to clear it of the ridiculous memory. The source of the rustling was… in the air vents!

But where did the vent lead. Seungcheol mentally arranged the floorplan of the school as he knew it. Save for some more or less predictable alterations the building underwent on its own, it was fairly straightforward.

And this vent led straight to the library. Somebody was doing magic in proximity to the grimoire again and doubtlessly making a mess of other books in the process. The old magic thing had a tendency to get jealous of other bound works. Go figure.

 

*************************

 

Mingyu found Jihoon in his lab, filling a bag with tools. The lights were dimmer than usual, suggesting the pink haired boy did not intend to stay around.

“Jihoon? Are you going somewhere?”

“None of your business.”

“I was just-“

“Going to ask me for another favor. I really don’t have time to adapt more recipes for you. I’m planning an expedition.”

“To hell?”

“Yes. How did you figure? I haven’t been to the underworld in a while.”

Mingyu mumbled “Your subjects must miss you terribly, tiny satan.”

“What?!”

“Nothing!”

“Anyway, I’ll be gone for a day. And I’m busy the whole week. See you.”

Jihoon went for the door, passing Mingyu without a second glance. The tall boy ran after the potion’s master. “I want to come with you, please.”

“What? Why?” Jihoon waited for Mingyu to follow him outside, closed the lab door and locked it up.

Mingyu walked casually next to Jihoon, who was taking about four steps for each of Mingyu’s. The tall boy had no trouble keeping up. He held his head as low as possible to cause maximum lost-puppy-ness. He had to play every card in his deck. “I… I need something from the crimson valley. Are we going there? Or close by?”

“What makes you think there’s a _we_?”

“Please! I’ll be good. I’ll carry your bag.”

Jihoon stopped running and slammed the tool bag into Mingyu’s stomach. “Fine. But I’m not making any extra detours for you. Pack your stuff and see me in the ritual room. I’ll call Jun now.”

“Thanks Wooz- _Jihoon_.”

The shorter boy mumbled a noncommittal reply and rolled his eyes before dashing off.

 

*************************

 

What Seungcheol found astonished even him. After spending four years around wizards and their shenanigans he thought he had seen it all. But not this.

The library was a forest of paper. Every book, every shelf, every piece of furniture had been incorporated by gently moving vines and solid tendons running from floor to ceiling. The paper forest was a cacophony of white leaves, filled with black ink. Written words and drawings were this jungle’s bark and grass.

Carefully Seungcheol walked further in. He was fascinated. This was definitely something.

The center of the forest and the origin of the vines was the grimoire’s podium.

Unbeknownst to the prefect, paper was growing around his ankle. When he felt it, it was too late. The gasping boy was lifted into the air, feet first. His own shirt obscured his vision.

Struggling to get free, Seungcheol didn’t realize that he was being moved further in – towards the ancient book. He was swallowed whole, so fast he didn’t even have time to scream.

Seungcheol was no longer part of reality. A written world awaited.

The paper rustled on.


	12. Conjuration

 

Wonwoo had read up on the so called AM to his satisfaction. The information seemed to check out. Now he need a plan. He was going to steal an object of extreme value and even greater power. An ancient item from the underworld. He – a mundane boy.

Obviously he had to get himself some magical help. After going to Pledis for a few years he should have a firm grasp on how to use a wand, right? Just shake the thing and point and then maybe mumble some stuff. How hard could that be?

The first thing he needed was a wand. He wasn’t going to steal it, just borrow it for a bit without asking.

Even before leaving his room he had to admit that this idea was stupid and would likely go horribly wrong but after reading about the AM’s powers for so long he couldn’t give it a rest. If one thing could make Mingyu fall for him he had to have it. Even if it meant stealing from monks.

Wonwoo strolled down the corridors, looking for a wizard whose wand he could borrow, but nobody was conveniently asleep in the usual spots.

Chan came running along the corridor, screaming.

Pledis School survival rule number one: if a wizard runs away from something, you run the same way.

Wonwoo jogged along the younger boy. “Hey Chan. What are we running from?”

“Outside…conjured…horrible… Must. Get. Help.” He took a deep breath. “Don’t tell Seungcheol!”

“Outside?” Wonwoo slowed down and fell back. No reason to keep running then. And certainly no reason to exhaust himself.

“Yes…outside…find…help…”

Chan turned around a corner and was out of sight. For a moment Wonwoo considered his options. Chan hadn’t had his wand ready which probably meant he didn’t have it on him at all. Would Wonwoo bring himself to the point of breaking into the dorm’s maknae’s room and stealing his most prized possession?

 

*************************

 

Five minutes later Wonwoo was up on the roof, Chan’s wand carefully tucked away in his pocket. He had left the little boy a bar of chocolate in return.

With a thick saw in his hand, Wonwoo went to work. The inverted lightning rods on the roof were collectors of stray magic. The things going on in the school produced a lot of power that didn’t go anywhere. And the mundane boy needed a power source to use in conjunction with the wand if he wanted to use it at all.

He sawed off one of the metal sticks and duct taped it together with the wand. There, that should work. Maybe.

Wonwoo wasn’t stupid of course. Alright, he knew he was about to _do_ something stupid – but he was going to be clever about it.

 

*************************

 

Black flames formed a vertical split through reality, an even blacker line emerging inside the cold fire. Jun stepped into the ritual room as soon as the rift was broad enough.

The vampire held his dadao in a tight grip. “We could have done that this morning before our class left.”

Jihoon waved his concerns away. “I didn’t know you were still on permanent excursion. Anyway, I’m having my own. And this huge puppy is coming with me for some reason.” He gesture over to where Mingyu was leaning against the wall.

“Whatever,” said Jun, “Let’s just get it on with. Shadowtravel is not the most comfortable way to get around but… wait, does Mingyu know what he’s getting into?”

The tall boy looked unsure but nodded. Jun could only hope against hope that Jihoon had explained everything patiently.

When the rift in reality that had brought him here closed, Jun raised his dadao and created a new one by slicing right through the universe itself.

He pushed and pulled until the split in the world was big enough to let two boys through. One tall and intimidated, one short and intimidating.

Once the duo had gone to hell, Jun let the rift close and reopened the original one. The one that led him back to the beach. He found his classmates engaged in open warfare, the castle under brutal siege.

 

*************************

 

Mingyu exited the portal and went on his knees, hitting the warm stone floor. He fought the nausea from interdimensional travel with deep breaths. The heat didn’t help but the light was comfortably dim, a blue glimmer falling onto the hellscape from no discernable source.

He got up and pulled out his wand. Whispering a cooling charm did the trick and kept him at an agreeable temperature.

It was a huge cave. No, it was a steep valley. Or a canyon? In any case, the boys were surrounded by stone on both sides, rising high into the non-sky where fog obscured the potential ceiling. The walls were smoothed from ancient erosion – lava or water, Mingyu didn’t know what was likelier – and led in a repeatedly widening and narrowing manner along winding paths. Smaller caves branched off every hundred meters of so. The area was sparsely populated with vegetation but what was there was spectacularly deformed, with thorns and teeth and even claws all over.

Jihoon had wasted no time and was already plucking leaves off a deep azure colored plant, that made noises sounding suspiciously like a high pitched “ouch”.

“Stop gaping, puppy boy. Start helping.” Jihoon didn’t even turn to face Mingyu. “Put on the thickest gloves in that bag and go over to the Flesh Maiming Mega-Thorn. Cast a calming spell. Might as well put you to use since you’re here and I’ve always wanted to grab some of its spikes. Don’t get too close. It bites. And it’s very hostile.”

“When are we going to get to the crimson valley?”

“The sooner you stop nagging, the sooner you can work and the sooner we can move further inland… or incave.”

“Yes, Sir.”

 

*************************

 

Chan had alerted two of his friends that he had encountered while running around in a panic. Hansol was quick on his feet but merely mundane and as such of limited use. Minghao had been difficult to talk to. A rambling, gasping, screeching Chan was difficult enough to understand, even without the language barrier.

Regardless, the two boys accompanied Chan outside.

“Where did it go? Where is it? We have to find it before it wreaks havoc.”

The boy waved his dinosaur book in the air as if he was trying to catch invisible stray dinos.

“Listen,” said Hansol slowly. “Are you sure you saw-“

“There’s a T-Rex on the loose! Now help me look. Oh-“

The trio turned around and finally Minghao understood what the words meant that he hadn’t been so sure about.

The huge lizard peacefully stood by the fence, staring across onto the road. If it wanted it could easily have trampled over the wires and stared grabbing some appetizers. For example, pedestrians.

Hansol whispered “Nobody move. If we don't move it can’t see us.”

“It’s not even looking at us.” Chan watched in awe. “How do we get it back in the book?”

“You’re asking me? You’re the wizard!”

“But I can’t use my wand.”

“What? Why? Nevermind, I remember. Okay, well maybe Minghao… _Where is Minghao_?”

The Chinese wizard was absent and neither of the younger had noticed.

“He bailed,” said Hansol.

“He’ll tell the headmaster,” groaned Chan.

“I got bait,” said Minghao as he popped into existence between them. He held a box full of chicken. Frozen chicken that he had taken from the kitchen.

“No Minghao,” said Hansol forcefully, “that’s dinner. What are we going to eat if we feed that to a dinosaur? What are the others in the dorm going to eat? They’ll lynch us if we steal todays dinner.”

Chan grabbed Hansol’s shoulder. “One problem at a time, please. We need to banish the T-Rex. Please. Pleeeease.”

“Ugh. Alright. What’s the plan?”

Luckily Chan knew – roughly – what to do. “Someone baits the thing to make it stand still. Someone else speaks the charm. That’s Minghao’s job. And someone else holds the book to catch the image.”

“You’ve summoned the beast, you be the bait.”

“…Actually I need to hold the book. Only I can react to the de-summoning in the right way. The sigils on the page need to meet the manaflux at the angle of the least reflec-“

“Ugh, fine.” Hansol resigned to his fate. When he had gotten up in the morning he did _not_ think he’d be dinosaur bait.

He grabbed the chicken with more confidence than he felt and walked up to the T-Rex. His steps slowed down as he got closer. The beast was huge. Really, really huge. Minghao would whisk him away if danger was imminent. Right? _Right_!? He realized that he should have cleared a few things up with the wizards beforehand.

The dino turned towards the boy, it’s comically small arms flailing aimlessly. Huge eyes looked down at the rapper, just a few dozen meters away. It's teeth were somewhere between huge daggers and small swords in their size.

Hansol felt very tasty and chewable. He laid the chicken on the ground and backed off, his fingers cramping as he let go of the poultry, while the rest of his body shook with horror.

Once the T-Rex moved the tiniest bit, the boy ran. The creature didn’t pursue. Chan could have told him that Tyrannosaurus prefers his food delivered, not caught. It was carrion eater. The young wizard had forgotten that not everybody was as well versed in dino-lore as he.

Before long, Minghao started casting, a faint net spanning the distance to the beast. Chan stood at attention, ready to catch. He could only hope that nobody had been looking out the window. And there were still two more of them on the loose.

Furthermore: Once that problem was solved there was still the very real possibility of him being roasted over open fire if he didn’t find a new dinner for the dorm.


	13. Mysticism

 

The exhibit wasn’t in the main temple itself but a building on the temple ground that was clearly built for the purpose of receiving visitors. It was modern art – both the building and the usual installations. Now however, the contents were ancient relicts from all over the world.

Wonwoo shifted quite uncomfortably in line for the ticket. The two duct taped sticks had been too long to fit in his pockets and he had been afraid that any bag might get searched at the entrance, so he had brought nothing but his “I hate you” shirt and skinny jeans. The wand-lightning-rod combo was tugged into his hair, covered by a beanie. The sticks pocked his head and were starting to rub him sore.

Finally he got in and went straight to the bathroom. The ticket price had been steep, but he reminded himself that he was about to steal a priceless artefact so it wasn’t as if he didn’t get more than equal with the museum.

After making sure he was the only one in the bathroom, he slipped the improvised wand into his side pocket, not concerned anymore that anyone might think it weird. He only had needed to avoid questions at the entrance.

Looking at his face in the mirror, he pondered what to say to himself as a pep talk, but drew a blank. He had come to commit his first major crime and his reason was to mind-manipulate his best friend because of a persistent teen age crush. There was no way for him to talk sense into himself, because none of it made sense to begin with.

“Oh, the things I do for your love,” he mumbled. “You better be worth this, Kim Mingyu.”

The next few minutes were spent snooping around to figure out the best escape route. Wonwoo intended to leave through the main entrance if possible but had to calculate the odds of other options. He figured he could always blast a window open. He was on the first floor, what could happen?

Then he laid eyes on the object of desire. There in a glass case in the middle of an alcove. The Adore-Me was a little bigger than he had expected, but it would fit under his beanie quite nicely. It looked heavy, perhaps of pure gold. The runes were definitely demonic but nothing else seemed off about it, making Wonwoo deem it save for theft.

He waited patiently until no one else was in the room – the exposition was not empty but not too popular either – and looked around one last time.

With shaking hands the boy pulled out his makeshift wand and wiggled it in the direction of the Adore-Me.

“Please, make something good happen. Help me magic. Pretty please?”

He could feel the sparks jumping from the metal stick into the wooden one and the smell of ozone filled the air – stray magic. He felt an inexplicable pull towards the glass case. His vision blurred – No, it was the room that lost substance!

The ground beneath Wonwoo’s feet had turned wobbly, like it was melting. He closed the distance to the Adore-Me and put his free hand on the glass. It gave way like warm butter. Slightly disgusted, the boy reached through the glass goo, stretching it until he broke through the transparent sludge.

The Adore-Me was perfectly solid. He lifted it from its little plastic podium and shoved it under his headwear, making sure it was well covered by his hair to keep it from shifting around.

The room returned to its solid state and any trace of his actions were gone. The perfect crime.

Wonwoo turned around to bail when his spine registered an all too familiar shiver. During his academic carrier he had felt enough magical wards going off to be able to tell the sensation apart from any regular old goosebumps.

Two things battled for attention in his panicking mind. Firstly, he had set of some kind of alarm. Second, the monks had magic.

 

*************************

 

Even as they had entered the Valley of Crimson Mingyu couldn’t catch a break. His joints were killing him from the huge bags he was forced to carry. Jihoon had insisted on taking samples of everything he encountered since “You offered to accompany me, so you do as I say, now stop sighing.”

Mingyu spent most of the time pitying himself. At least when he wasn’t busy getting attacked by hostile plant life. Hostile to people who tried to plug them, which is what Jihoon made him do. Over and over.

The tall boy had a growing suspicion that half the herbs he picked were utterly useless and Jihoon only made him plug stuff that he knew would fight back. The pink haired bastard was certainly entertained enough to lend this hypothesis credibility.

When they encountered a Dokkaebi Mingyu wasn’t even surprised. They hadn’t seen anyone down here yet, so of course the first person to greet them would be a mischievous, grotesque trickster demon. It was only natural.

“Human not walk here. Human pay Dokkaebi.”

Jihoon walked up to the superhumanly tall, strangely proportioned goblin, looking up at the thick head a good two meter’s above him. “Listen you ugly mofo, I’ve come here for so long you can’t even count that far. Step aside before someone gets hurt.”

The demon roared with laughter. “Human funny. Dokkaebi have good day. No hurt human. Yet. Give payment or walk other way.”

“Crawl back into your hole, dogface.”

Mingyu put his hand on Jihoon’s shoulder. “Er… Maybe don’t get into a fight? My wand it really tired out, I’m not sure I can get us to safety if-“

The demon tore the bags off Mingyu’s shoulders and lifted them far out of either boy’s reach. The fairly broad shouldered wizard felt quite small in front of the creature – which was an unusual experience for him.

“Good herbs. Dokkaebi payment. Human good pay.”

Jihoon’s face had taken on a red tinge – which was hard to tell in the appropriately named crimson valley.

“You give that back!”

The demon only lifted the bags higher.

“Human can leave now.”

“Give. Them. Back.”

“Small human annoying.”

“What!?”

“Small human. Or fairy? Yes, you small human. Very annoying. Very small. Tiny. Very-“

Jihoon bent his knees.

At first Mingyu thought the mundane potion expert was going to jump up in an attempt to grab the bags to save his pride as futile as it was, but the boy’s aim was something else.

Jihoon head-butted the giant demon in the balls.

With a faint sigh, the demon toppled over. His back hit the ground with a loud thud.

“Mingyu, pick up my bags. Let’s keep going.”

“Yes, sir.”

The shorter boy walked right on. Mingyu collected their belongings and bent over the demon, who was still on the ground, drawing deep breaths. “Mister Dokkaebi? Are you okay?”

“Tall human. It hurts. Protect Dokkaebi from evil fairy. Please.”

“Um, you don’t happen to know where I can find something called the Adore-Me amulet?”

“Human keep annoying fairy away if tell?”

“Yes.”

The demon was very cooperative.

 

*************************

 

“Jisoo?” asked Seokmin. “Can you stop playing? You know I love your sounds but if your music makes me eat any more chocolate I’ll get fat.”

“Oh, sorry.”

Jisoo got up and pondered where to play if not in the common room. Hm, usually Seungcheol came along at some point and told him to get lost – with varying degrees of nicety. He hadn’t encountered a distraught prefect for a while.

“Seokmin, do you know where Cheol is hiding?”

“No idea. Sulking somewhere I guess. Maybe the angle has rejected him again or something.”

The guitar player let his hands wander over some of the twenty or so rosaries he had on him as he tried to remember if he had witnessed any angle activity that day. “Nah, I’d know that. Jeonghan makes sure I’m there whenever he torments our Cheollie. It’s just funnier in a crowd.”

As if on command a piece of paper – torn from an old book by the looks of it – fell from the ceiling. Jisoo looked up to see more fragments falling down. The air vents were leaking. For a moment if snowed paper in the common room.

Seokmin collected them. “This isn’t the weirdest thing that happened this week, but definitely today. Unless you’ve seen anything?”

“Nope, most classes are still at the beach so I’ve spent the morning seeing almost no magic. Should we investigate this?”

“Look,” Seokmin said and pointed at the pieces he had arranged. Some words were _emphasized_. Some through highlighting, some through underlining, some through blacking out everything else on the page fragment.

The same words were marked over and over. “Help”, “Trapped”, “Book”, “Seungcheol”.

“Well, this is odd,” said Seokmin, matter of fact-ly.

 

*************************

 

Jun sliced apart a crab taller than himself. He swung the dadao like it was weightless. The sea creature’s corpse collapsed on the pile of three of its comrades. Ducking under a thrown spear he jumped back into the sand construction. The spear got stuck in the door just as Jun threw himself against it to close it shut. The sharpened wood broke through the splintering seashell door.

Castle Beach Excursion was falling. The crab army had breached the west wall, bringing down a corner tower with it. The courtyard was overflowing with intruders.

Beams came from the keep. Green lines that cut the air – and the crabs. Soonyoung was standing on top of the main tower, clearing a path for Jun.

Slashing up warrior crustaceans left and right, the vampire made his way to the keep’s gate. Jeonghan opened wide enough to let him in and slammed the huge shells closed behind him.

“Glad you’re back.”

“What happened?”

The angle shrugged. “We got attacked. It happened really fast. I dunno. Seems like the teachers haven’t noticed what happened yet. I’m going to fly over and tell them.”

“Can’t we deal with this on your own?” said Jun and let his blade shimmer in the dim light that fell in from the thin windows and the glowing orb the angel or the wizard must have hastily cast into existence before when they had retreated.

Outside, crabs were still getting roasted by Soonyoung’s beams.

“Some help?” yelled the wizard from the roof, down the narrow stairs. Crude arrows hailed against the keep and occasionally made it through the windows. The compact sand of the tower was beginning to crack in places.

Jun rushed upwards with superhuman speed. “If we get in trouble, Jeonghan, that’s when you can fly over and inform the authorities. But until then, let’s show the sea critter what we’re made of.”

The vampire arrived at the tower’s roof, stepped up to the ledge, nodded at Soonyoung, surveyed the surrounding, lifted his dadao, noticed it vibrating with bloodlust… and jumped off.

Three level’s down, the number of crabs got reduced by one. The last thing it saw was a pair of boots, descending from up high. The last thing it heard was its own body.

* _Splotch_ *


	14. Thaumaturgy

 

 _Of course_ the monks had dogs.

Wonwoo found himself chased along the gallery while metal grating sank down in front of all the windows, cutting off his secondary retreat path. The barking was coming closer.

He made his escape past the other visitors, who seemed too confused to react and didn’t even get out of his way. The Adore-Me was bouncing against his skull, barely shielded by his hair. The wand was still in his hand.

He made it to the end of the corridor where monks were already waiting to cut him off from the entrance. Damn. They wore full body robes now, covering their faces, even armored in the important places. They wielded nunchakus and shuriken, moving in his direction. Even damner.

“Chosen one! He who is emo. Why have you returned? And to bring unrest, no less.”

“I’m not emo.”

“Suffer for your crimes, trickster.”

Wonwoo sliced the air with his wand, vaguely aiming at them, and a lightning bolt smashed into the floor, just to bounce off and strike the ceiling. The monks looked at each other, pausing only for a second, and started pursuit. As the first one stepped under the charred spot, a huge tentacle erupted from the concrete as if the ocean was on the museum’s second level.

Magic had a humor Wonwoo never really appreciated, but now he chuckled at the sight without inhibition. The tentacle flailed at the battle monks and kept them at bay. A few of them conjured fireballs and attacked the outgrowth but the slimy thing barely reacted to the impact, shielding the thief from the guards.

The dogs arrived from behind, trapping Wonwoo. A few more battle monks followed them. Again he smashed his wand in a forceful pointing gesture. A bright orange light flowed from the vibrating sticks, blinding everybody present. As Wonwoo regained his vision he saw the same corridor as before but impossibly stretched. The dogs were a few hundred meters away.

They were, however, still gaining on him. He couldn’t get past them and he couldn’t get past the monks that were slowly hacking away at the ceiling’s tentacle. Wonwoo had the choice to stay and fight, possibly causing serious injuries to temple dwellers and hounds, or… flee from a narrow corridor somehow.

He patted the wand as if it was an obedient pet. “Please, help me out of here. Be a good magic device. I have no idea how much juice is still left in you, but if there’s something that’ll get me out of here… do it now, _please_.”

The response was swift. Wonwoo’s wand led his hand towards the wall at his side. As he touched it waves rippled from the point of impact. The air chilled.

As the first shuriken came flying his way, missing his neck by hair’s width, ice crystal appeared. The wall broke into pieces, shattering like glass. The shards formed fragile, spiky stairs unto the second floor. The boy raced upwards.

The climbable wall of ice and concrete shards began to melt even before he was fully upstairs. As the first few dogs arrived at the bottom, they began their ascent, but found themselves slipping down as soon as they had made a few steps.

Wonwoo was save. He was also still trapped, now too high above the ground to jump from a window.

The ice stairs retreated back into a cracked wall, cutting off his ground floor pursuers entirely. But new battle monks were already in position on his level. He found himself in a huge, oval room. Art installations lined the sides between pillars. The ceiling was sparkling with a skylight, used to hang up beautiful crystal stars. The sun fell inside, warming the scene as the boy got surrounded.

There was a third floor above, a promenade leading around the oval shape. More battle monks – and blood hounds - were already taking position there.

“Okay, my little friend, I know I’m asking a lot, but I promise I’m bringing you straight back to Chan if you help me out of here.”

The world went gray and cold. The stench of ozone everywhere. Sound vanished, leaving a jarring, surreal emptiness.

Time had frozen. Even the shuriken, dark curses and lightning bolts that had come his way were suspended in midair.

“I didn’t even know that’s possible. Magic is _so_ damn overpowered.”

Wonwoo ran upstairs after confirming that the way down was blocked by time-frozen chasers. The fact that his steps made no sounds in this timeless world have him goosebumps.

The third and final floor was chock full of people who’d want his head as soon as time unfroze so he had to find a way out quickly. Where to go? What to do? How to escape?

Time returned to the art gallery and Wonwoo had precious few seconds before his pursuers would notice his new position. He had to get out. There was exactly one window, not protected by metal bars: Above him.

 

*************************

 

Somehow the Compsognathus managed to hide in the kitchen. This was not much of a surprise. The chicken sized dinosaur had simply followed the smell of snacks that emanated from the room whenever a student or two didn’t fully close a can or box. It was however, a bit unfortunate as the dino troopers Chan, Hansol and Minghao had spent the day outside, weeding through the school grounds and neglecting the possibility that the not-so-extinct animals could have remained inside.

Because of this, other students had found the little, angry dino first and raised the appropriate ruckus. It had cost Chan his month’s ration in sweets and a weeks’ worth of pocket money to buy the silence of Doyoon, Ming Ming and Dongjin, but he couldn’t let the incident get reported.

At last, the three hunters had surrounded the little fellow, who was peeping at them like a sad kitten. The door was locked, to keep other students out. The Compsognathus had its back to the wall and looked around nervously for a route to safety.

“Minghao,” said Chan, holding up the open book, “anytime now.”

“But it’s so cute. Can’t we keep it?”

“Absolutely not. Someone would find out it came from me. I just know it. And even if not, Seungcheol it such a jerk. He always finds a way to blame _me_ for the things I do wrong.”

“Aww, but it’s so cuddly and-“

Chan slammed the book into Hansol’s chest and grabbed Minghao’s wand arm. “Now! Do it now.”

“No, let me go,” Minghao yelled before swearing at the maknae in Chinese.

The dinosaur saw its chance. Lunging forward, the little creature tried to make its way through the fighting wizards’ legs. Both boys screamed in surprise.

The combined force of two wizards slamming down a single wand caused an eruption of sparks and lightning that made every cup and plate in the surrounding cabinets tremble audibly.

Exploding into the air, the Compsognathus screeched before flying in a high arc across the room, a trail of fire behind it.

Hansol jumped in its path, the book raised high above his head, and tried to catch it in the archeological volume like catching a tennis ball with a racket. But the dino hadn’t been properly enchanted for a return into the book and slammed against the pages.

It was smacked onto the floor with a dull thump and didn’t move.

Minghao yelled “You _killed_ it.”

Hansol yelled back “No, _you_ killed it.”

“No, _you_ killed it.”

“No, you.”

“No, y-“

“Uuughhhh!” Chan sank to the ground, his hands tearing on his hair. He’d have to confess everything. Now he had a slab of meat the size of a chicken in the kitchen and no chicken in the freezer for dinner and-

“Hey,” said Chan, slowly standing back up again. “I think we just solved two problems at once. Do either of you know how to prepare meat?”

The Chinese wizard scratched his head. “I think I have seen a spell for that in my magical home economics book.”

Chan was smiling for the first time in a few hours. “Go grab it. I’ll fire up the grill.”

 

*************************

 

The wand wasn’t responding. The lightning rod felt cool. It hadn’t before. Was it drained now?

“Please work, please.”

Nothing. The monks realized where he had reappeared. Shouts came his way and soon they’d be followed by weapons and spells.

“Please? I’ll do anything. I don’t know if a piece of wood can understand this, but all I’ve done today I’ve done for love. Don’t let it end like this. I need him.”

Maybe the wand still had a load in reserve. Maybe it was magic itself responding to the plea. A huge burst of power blew everybody on the third floor to the ground. But the devastating gust of wind was only a side-effect. A blast of air - so dense it was nearly material – erupted from Chan’s wand and tore the skylight to dust.

Moreover, the same room-destabilization occurred as it had in the Adore-Me’s room. The monks didn’t have time to get up before they found themselves stuck in the ground, sinking a finger width into the linoleum. Wonwoo alone was unaffected by the goo floor.

The wand vibrated with life, the useless metal rod dropping as the duct tape vaporized.

“Thank you, Chan’s wand. Thank you so much. I don’t know what you are, but I hope I can make it up to you somehow. Now… how do I get-“

Again the wand led his hand. Wonwoo touched his head with the tip of the stick.

The boy and all he carried turned into a thousand bright canaries.

The swarm fluttered around the hall, chirping as if to mock the struggling guards and visitors. As one, the flock of Wonwoo-bits rushed out the hole above, knowing the way home as if by intuition.

 

*************************

 

There was one last dinosaurian being missing from the pages.

The trio found the Pterodactyl exactly where they expected. On the roof. And it had already built a nest made of twigs, newspaper, plastic bags and a whole lot of empty bottles.

As it saw the boys, it spread its wings and cawed with its long beak anytime they stepped too close, but it seemed unwilling to fly off. Hansol held a net ready, Minghao performed the charm and Chan held up the book.

The three boys surrounded the prehistoric avian and the charm went off without a hitch. The boys sighed in relieve as the image reappeared in the book and Chan danced in triumph, swinging the hardback around like a dance partner.

Hansol peeked into the nest. “Channie? Hyung? We have a problem.”

Three large, smooth textured orbs were sitting in the mixture of twigs and trash. They were the reason the Pterodactyl had refused to leave the nest. It had laid eggs.

“We can’t get those in the book,” said Chan to himself, “But we can’t let them hatch either.”

He turned to his companions. “I know. This is no problem at all. The hyungs will love me if I make fried egg rice with the erm… chicken. This is the opposite of a problem. We’re having a dinosaur feast.”


	15. Elementalism

 

The library was a mess. Paper had grown into a wiggling abomination that covered every available surface. Scrolls and papers, new and ancient, empty and fully coated with writing, spotless and ink stained. Everything was enwrapped.

Seokmin and Jisoo were standing outside, glancing through the half opened door.

“Do you think we should tell the authorities?” Seokmin wondered out loud.

“That’s a rhetorical question, right?” Jisoo gave back. “It’s paper. We brought hairspray and lighters. And I’m sure it was someone from our dorm that made this mess. It usually is. So let’s fix it first and then figure out what happened and who need to get one of Seungcheol’s sermons. Which are not in any way as good as church sermons.”

“Whatever you say. You have more magic experience than me, hyung.”

“Just with guitars.”

“Yeah. Still.”

“Anyhow… _Attack_!”

The boys rushed into the room, Jisoo’s rosaries clacking on his arms, Seokmin’s grin brightening the attack path.

They sprayed fire onto the nearest paper tendons. The vines struck back, attempting to slap the cans and lighters out of the attacker’s hands.

“Were not making any progress,” Seokmin said, eyes fixated on the vines that gave him the most trouble.

Even though most of the library was now on fire, the paper didn’t recede. Which was a problem of its own, but the most of the library _being on fire_ was also one.

“I’m starting to think this wasn’t the best plan,” said Jisoo.

The sprinkler system activated with worrying delay. Water rained from the nozzles on the books and pages everywhere. All the paper vines turned to sludge. Even the harder parts of the library-monster became unstable.

The boys tore their way through the rapidly soaking paper and made it to the center of the mess. Neither were surprised to find the grimoire as the origin.

Its paper tentacles wiggled threateningly in their direction. They seemed unaffected by the water. And the book was still growing. More pages fell out, marked with cries for help.

“I think,” said Jisoo, “Cheollie’s in there.”

“ _How_?”

“…Magic.”

“Right.”

“Yeah. How do we get him out?”

Seokmin glanced at the grimoire, trying to _read it_. That is, he read it the way you read a person’s face, not a book. “Well, if he fell in, maybe we can pull him out?”

“Makes as much sense as anything.”

The duo began to tear pages from the library relic, but the book wasn’t having any of that. It fought back. It slapped Jisoo with a loose hardcover, inflicted paper cuts on Seokmin’s arms and threw so much paper at them that they were effectively blinded.

Retreating a few steps the boys waded in the wet slush that had once been a paper forest, which was still melting around them, the last few fires getting extinguished.

“Any other ideas?” asked Seokmin. “I’m not getting any more paper cuts. I’ll tell headmaster-“

“Hey, _I_ didn’t get any cuts.”

“Why not?”

Jisoo flashed his arms. They – together with his neck – were covered with rosaries.

“You’re basically armored,” said Seokmin.

“Maybe it’s more than that. Like with Chan’s demons.”

One look was enough to convey the entire plan. Jisoo slipped half his rosaries off and handed them over. The rest he took into his own hands.

As quickly as they could, the boys threw the necklaces over the oncoming paper flood and before long they had battled their way into the thicket of the grimoire itself. Again, they began tearing out pages, wrapping rosaries around the books exterior whenever possible.

Finally, a shoe became visible. The boys tore further into the pages, almost sinking into the grimoire themselves, but eventually they got to grab the offered foot and pulled. It was followed by a leg, then another struggling leg and hips connecting the two. Hands emerged from between the pages and helped along, pulling the trapped boy backwards out of his prison like a reverse birth.

With a deafening noise like a million papers tearing, one whole Seungcheol fell out. Sans shirt but with a lot of relief.

The half-naked boy crawled away from the book and gasped for air. “Th-thank you… I thought I was going to-“

A tentacle shot from the grimoire and snapped right around Seungcheol’s neck, squeezing the life out of him and dragging him back against his struggles. Jisoo smacked the last rosary down like a whip and the book closed itself, the tentacle retreating with a slurping sound.

Seungcheol collapsed on all fours, breath heavy. He was going to add quite a few rules to magic-book-use etiquette.

 

*************************

 

Once Mingyu was far enough from Jihoon to make sure the pink haired boy wouldn’t notice where he had left to, he ran the rest of the way. The demon’s directions had sounded plausible, albeit vague. Mingyu clutched his wand, always ready to fire, unsure what he was going to have to deal with.

The cave was where he had hoped to find it, and its entrance was many meters wide. The dim crimson light from outside only made it a few steps into the hole in the stone before fading out.

Only slowing down, but not stopping, Mingyu cast a light spell. As the darkness enveloped him, he shot the finished charm from his wand and got a white-blue shimmering orb for his efforts, which he dragged along like a helium balloon.

The cave turned into ruins. Pillars and arches lined the way deeper into the mountain. Down and inward. Down and inward. Always farther.

Several minutes of descent later, Mingyu exited into a wide open area, an ornate stone ceiling above him showing frescos of fights between wizards and dragons.

The bottom of the stone hall was a shallow lake. In its center was a huge altar – almost an island – covered with heaps of treasure. Gold and silver, jewelry and gem stones.

And around all those trinkets was a serpent, loosely wrapped around the altar, half in the water, its head on the biggest pile. The hundreds of meters long creature was sound asleep. Mingyu recognized it as an Imugi – a being that would turn into a dragon once it turned a thousand years old.

The wizard walked down into the water. He didn’t dare to cast any spells in vicinity of the massive, wizard fighting beast.

Instead he waded through the water that went barely up to his knees and hoped the waves he caused would not be enough to wake the Imugi. He moved carefully and made it all the way onto the artificial island.

The Adore-Me half was directly under the Imugi’s nose. Of course it was. This couldn’t be easy. Nothing ever was.

 

*************************

 

The entire class sprawled on conjured picnic blankets in front of the ruins of Castle Beach Excursion. The teacher had admitted that the building was the most impressive among the student’s creations but wanted to disqualify Jun, Jeonghan and Soonyoung. Both for accidentally creating a new species of hostile super crabs – plus inciting war with them and eradicating said new species – and because of the fact that the castle hadn’t survived.

Luckily the boys had a lot of crab meat with which to bribe the studentship and teachers.

So it came that – as the sun set over the class trippers – the smell of delicious delicacies filled the air. Jeonghan softly flapped his wings to keep the fire burning. Jun picked a piece of crab shell from his teeth, using his dadao which was comically big for the purpose. Soonyoung lay on his back and contemplated the day – or he tried to look like that was what he did. Truthfully he was about to fall asleep, his stomach full of meat. He only had to impress the teacher for a few more minutes, get an A+ and then he could drift off. It wasn’t every day that he had to join a battle with an army created by chance.

But at Pledis it was always nice to have something to point to as the weirdest thing that had happened in a while. It gave life a bit of structure to do so.

 

*************************

 

“Mingyu! Where have you been?”

“I just-“

“No more running off. You could have fallen into a ditch or gotten captured by the maneater Dokkaebi tribe. Did you know there are Imugi living in the area?”

“Yes… I mean no, sir.”

Jihoon sighed loudly. “Well, while you’ve been slacking off somewhere I was busy collecting. Let’s go home.”

“Yes, please.”

“I’m calling Jun. Did this little trip yield the result you wanted?”

“Sure did, cutie pie,” said Mingyu, petting the side of his pants were a half disk imprinted against the pant fabric.

“I told you before, I’m not cute,” said Jihoon very threateningly – but also very cutely.

 

*************************

 

Having been a flock of birds was weird. Getting to think “having been a flock of birds” was also weird. The entire day had been one of the stranger one’s for Wonwoo.

He walked carefully through the corridors of Pledis, not wanting to fall over some sort of magical contraption and lose the amulet at the last moment. The world seemed to like doing those things to him lately.

He made it all the way back into his room, where he took the Adore-Me out of his beanie and stowed it away in his pocket. Never again was he going to let a randomly summoned fire demon destroy his hard earned magical artefacts. Which was also weird thing to think.

Remembering the demon also reminded him of his promise to Chan’s wand.

He walked into the boy’s room and planted the stick on the desk where he had found it. The chocolate was still there so Chan likely hadn’t been back to notice the theft yet. All the better.

On his way back into his room he met Seungcheol being dragged along by Jisoo and Seokmin.

“Hey, Cheol. Where is your shirt?”

“A book ate it.”

“I see. Have a nice evening.”

Jisoo stopped Wonwoo. “You’re coming to dinner right? We’re having chicken. It will heal your heart.”

“Sure… when did I ever miss dinner? Heal my h- never mind. I don’t even want to know what’s going on. I had my own adventure.”

Chan came around the corner and stopped with wide eyes when he saw shirtless Seungcheol. His face scrunched up and everybody could guess he was trying to remember if the leader’s state could be somehow his fault.

“Channie?” Seungcheol said, with a low voice, “Did you leave the grimoire open?”

“No, and I did nothing else either. A totally event-free day. Didn’t even touch my wand. Now, if you’ll excuse me, the rest of the dino troopers asked me to bring more spices. I heard we’re having chicken tonight.”

Chan went his merry way and the others dispersed as well. When Seungcheol passed Wonwoo he glanced back for a moment. “Did that kid say… dino troopers?”


	16. Arcanism

 

The trip to hell and back had taken its toll on Mingyu. Being around Jihoon and having to follow his every order had been even worse.

And still, he held the Adore-Me. There was no way he was going to take a nap now, not when he was so close. As soon as Jihoon told him to lay down the bags, he dropped everything they had harvested and – against the pink haired boy’s protests – waltzed out the door, back into the school’s hallways.

His first objective was reaching his own room, but he didn’t intend to stay there for long. He took the liberty of slipping into a less sweat stained shirt and rushed to Wonwoo’s room.

Only precious few minutes until he could use the amulet on his love interest. He assumed he’d find out how to use it when he got that far. Theories formed in his head as he made his way through the corridors.

 

*************************

 

Wonwoo took a much more deliberate effort. Not being a wizard himself he couldn’t count on intuition guiding him, or a sudden burst of supernatural power fixing things for his pleasure. He had to go the strategic route and do actual research. Except the internet wasn’t a proper resource this time.

He’d have to go to the library.

With the Adore-Me half in his back pocket he left his room and started walking in the direction of the school’s reading room. Then the piece of metal began to move.

Slightly surprised by the vibrations near his buttocks, the boy pulled the amulet out of its hiding place and slowed down, coming to stand just past a corner.

“What’s going on with you?” he whispered to the object.

 

*************************

 

Mingyu arrived at Wonwoo’s room and found it empty. He rolled his eyes as he got a sense of déjà-vu. Was he going to keep running past Wonwoo again until a demon ruined his plans once more?

This time the wizard was better prepared. He had learned a clairvoyance-spell just in case he had to find Wonwoo again. Or any other person in the school for that matter.

Oddly the Adore-Me half in his pants began to tremble. He pulled it out and saw that it was indeed vibrating, but not doing anything else suspicious – like catching on fire, exploding, turning into a black hole or whatever else magical artefacts tended to do every so often.

With his free hand he cast the charm and was pointed in Wonwoo’s direction.

“Gottcha, loverboy,” he thought, already indulging in the idea of calling the handsome boy his.

*************************

 

Wonwoo was getting worried. The Adore-Me’s vibrations had kept rising in intensity as if something big was about to hit. It was becoming uncomfortable just holding onto the half disk. Maybe the thing didn’t want to be used by him. Was it because he wasn’t a wizard. Or perhaps it didn’t like to serve a sinister purpose. He wondered if he should rethink his approach. Was enchanting Mingyu a good idea? Especially like this, with an object he had no understanding off?

Doubts crept up on him as the amulet shook more and more violently. Was is possible that he and Mingyu weren’t meant to-

He didn’t get to finish the thought as he was shoved against the wall. Somebody tall had rushed around the corner and crashed into Wonwoo. He looked up at the flailing boy.

“Mingyu!”

“Oh, Hey!”

Their eyes met and so did the amulet’s halves. Jumping out of each boy’s grip, the Adore-Me completed itself before they noticed what was going on.

Nobody else was there to experience the blinding glare of the artefact recombining into a greater whole, but the disturbances rippling through the magic field were felt by the student and teacher body, magical and mundane alike.

 

*************************

 

Time was no longer.

Mingyu was twelve and blew out his birthday candles. The cake was chocolate and all his friends had come.

Wonwoo was nine and had fallen of the swing, with no one there to comfort him.

Mingyu was four and his best friend was an orange teddy bear. He screamed at his parents because they wouldn’t let him take the bear with them on vacation.

Wonwoo got his first flu shot and all he could think was how impressed his friends would be if they heard how courageously he had taken it.

Mingyu bled from his mouth into a sink and listened to his parents telling him it was okay, as he held the first baby tooth he ever lost.

Wonwoo’s first day of kindergarten went by without incident, but he spend the whole time being terrified out of his little mind.

Mingyu came to Pledis School and felt like an impostor from the very beginning, seemingly never good enough to hold up his own.

They relived their lives. Ups and downs. Alternately, in parallel, simultaneously, each got to see and feel and _live_ what the other had gone through. Every crush, every scar, every delight, every insecurity. The rooms they inhabited as children. The thoughts that had kept them awake in bed. And always, throughout every memory since the first day they had met, they had been a constant in each other lives. And they saw all.

The time Wonwoo had stolen from Mingyu’s private candy stash and blamed it on Chan. The time Mingyu had faked sick to stay in the dorm and watch cartoons while his classmates did their group project without him. The time Wonwoo had built a blanket fortress and waited to jump out and scare Mingyu once he would come but fell asleep in it instead. The time Mingyu had snuck into Wonwoo’s room to copy last year’s homework without asking.

And of course, the whole story with the love potion and the beanie. And the crushing. And the pining.

 

*************************

 

* _Pa-Ling_ *

The Adore-Me hit the ground - fully reforged.

As the light faded and their minds separated, returning from a timeless beyond, they found their fingers had automatically become entwined. The boys kept looking at each other, saying nothing. They didn’t have to anymore.

 

*************************

 

Seungcheol sat down at the kitchen table, hungry as a wolf. If that wolf had spent his day fighting his way out of a book.

Chan seemed to feel guilty about something as he kept trying to make sure the dorm leader was as comfortable as possible. But Seungcheol had no indication that the maknae was responsible for the mess in the library and chose not to investigate the matter.

“Channie, this chicken is delicious. Just a little dry. Would you-?”

“Yes, right away.”

The youngest boy ran back to the counter and grabbed more sauce. He poured plenty over Seungcheol’s dish. “Anything else, leader?”

“No, it’s fine. Sit down and have a bite. It’s really good. But are you sure this isn’t turkey? It doesn’t taste quite like chicken. Close but-“

“Erm, sure why not? More friend egg rice?” answered Chan in haste before switching the subject by asking everybody else about their day.

Soonyoung recollected the events at the beach, slightly dramatizing everything.

The angel stood up from his place and Jisoo – sans rosaries – followed him. Seungcheol expected them to vanish into their room as always, but they came up to his side of the table. He stopped moving the food, his hand frozen midway to his mouth. How were they going to make fun of him now? Probably mention once again how he had puked all over heaven. Must have been something he ate though he had no idea what. He’d never live that down.

“Cheollie?”

The leader sighed. He could only hope this humiliation would be a quick one.

“We - that is Jisoo and myself - wanted to know if you’d like to take a trip with us. Jisoo needs a lot of new rosaries.”

Seungcheol looked up and tried to make a suspicious expression but seeing the face of Jeonghan up close only brought back all the longing and pain that was so difficult to hide. “You need someone to pay for your shopping spree. That’s it, right?”

“What? No.”

“Someone to carry the bags for you then?”

“No. What makes you think I’d mistreat you like that, Cheollie?”

It was hard to get angry at the angel, even more so in front of half the dorm. But at least a little frustration found its way into the leader’s voice. “You’re going to lead me on and then drop me again. Like always.”

“Aww, it’s just because you’re so cute when you get rejected.”

“Well, you’ve rejected me plenty of times.” Seungcheol didn’t dare to meet the angel’s eyes, afraid he wouldn’t be able to say what he needed to. “So I’d appreciate if you left with your boyfriend and didn’t keep leading me on.”

“Boyfriend? Ha. …Hahahah,” Jeonghan laughed his monotonous, but heartfelt laughter. “Jisoo just likes spending time around an agent of the lord.”

Jisoo shook his head slowly. “Yeah, I can’t sully my flesh with such worldly urges that boyfriendery entails. No way.”

“Then…” Seungcheol looked up.

“It’s a date. If you want. That is, if you don’t mind Jisoo third wheeling.”

“A…date…”

Terrified that it was all a ploy to humiliate him again, the leader rose from his seat and tried to get a grip on reality, his sanity having become a bit slippery over the events of the day.

Mingyu and Wonwoo entered, holding hands. Every head turned to them. Every pair of eyes fixated on them, expecting them to speak up and explain. But they didn’t seem to realize they weren’t the only people in the world.

Seokmin broke the silence. “Hello you two. So… I guess we all want to ask. Does this mean you’re finally… more than friends?”

“Yes”, said Wonwoo.

“We are more than friends,” said Mingyu.

With one glance into each other’s eyes, they spoke in unison. “We’re… _best friends_.”

 

*************************

 

Thirteen boys munched on meat that didn’t quite taste like chicken. Three of them were closer than usual, planning a shopping trip. Three more – called the dino troopers for reasons they would never give away – kept exchanging looks to make sure no one suspected the food. And a duo that had always been fairly close, couldn’t stop looking at each other.

As the sun set over Pledis School for the magical and the mundane, a certain amulet sparkled one last time in its new hiding place as the last solar rays of the day hit its golden surface. Had anyone been able to observe it, the Adore-Me’s gleam could have looked quite smug.

 

**THE END**

 

 

**Note: There will be four spin-offs in this sequence.**

After spending so much time in this universe I couldn't let it go. I just have to spend some time with other pairings before I can move on. The four stories will be connected by a common thread, but tell seperate tales that can be enjoyed on their own each.

These will be as follows:

Jeonghan/Seungcheol in Mom and Dad are going to Heaven

Jihoon/Soonyoung in Lock and Key

Hansol/Seungkwan in Chill, Swag and Fairydust

Jun/Minghao in Desire and Affection and Zombies

_These will eventually be links once they're up._

I hope you like them just as much as this one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally done. Originally this was supposed to end after the fire demon attack but I had so many ideas left. My longest ever fanfiction. I really, really hope this was worth it.  
> Tell me what you thought. What was great, what less so? My greatest fear is that somebody will tell me I completely forgot to ever mention one of the boys. How can they have so many members? Do they not know how hard it is for fanfic writers to put thirteen main characters in one story?  
> Enough rambling. Thank you, if you read all the way through.


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